Pharmacy is one of the recent trends in careers revolving healthcare that have continually been on a steady rise and demand. Since the late 2000’s, more and more students have leaned on taking the pharmaceutical route especially for those that wish to become doctors later on in their medical careers. With this, the course has a lot of pre-medical undergraduate schools aiming high on being considered as valuable sources in which to produce quality pharmacists. One of the measures of such high caliber is determined by the high passing rates of the batches of examinees that go through the bi-yearly board licensure examinations. This year proved to be quite promising in the pharmacy field, as both March and August 2018 pharmacist licensure examination results were evaluated by Local Pulse and 41 listed schools in which one would have the best opportunities in learning should they pursue Pharmacy.
The basis of the ranking of best pharmaceutical schools are founded by 5 criteria:
First, the overall yearly school board performance (40%). These results are weighed in and based on the total number of examinees in each examination period. In connection to this, the second criteria, the number of examinees (20%), is also scrutinized as large number of examinees make the passing percentage rate very hard to maintain.
The third criterion is the ranks of top performing examinees (10%). Examinees who made it in the list of topnotchers give their schools high scores based on their ranks as consideration.
Level of accreditation (20%) is another thing to consider in the ranking system, as a high accreditation status from governing bodies such as the Philippine Association of Colleges and Universities Commission on Accreditation (PACUCOA), Philippine Accrediting Association of Schools, Colleges and Universities (PAASCU), Accrediting Agency of Chartered Colleges and Universities in the Philippines (AACUP), or Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) recognize the schools as Centers of Excellence and Development with strong and sound curricula and programs related to the course.
The fifth criterion for the best schools is the faculty student ratio (20%) as studies show the significance of low student-faculty ratio increasing the success rate of examinees achieving high passing rates in licensure examinations.
As of 2018, the 41 institutions bested in Pharmacy Programs, which doubled as compared to the 22 listed just the year before. Maintaining the top spot is the University of Sto. Tomas, the oldest university in the Philippines and is also known as the first to open and teach Pharmacy in the country. The passing rate decreased based on the 2017 results, a 94.76 to now a 93.19%. Still, UST has the major lead given that the next school is Centro Escolar University Manila, with a percentage rate of 84.49%. Saint Louis University in Baguio holds the third rank at 82.41%, and the fourth rank to the University of the Philippines Manila at 78.50%. The fifth rank, Our Lady of Fatima University in Valenzuela is at 76%, while Adamson University, another university in Manila, holds the sixth rank at 73.88%. The seventh in ranking, and the first in the Visayas Region, is the University of San Carlos of Cebu at 74.24%, followed by the University of the Immaculate Conception, holding the eighth rank and being the first entry in the Mindanao Region at 70.65%. San Pedro College of Davao holds the ninth rank at 79.10%, while Centro Escolar University of Malolos City at 10th rank with 67.61% overall score.
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To see full rankings and breakdowns of the criteria as well as the other top 11-41 Pharmacy schools, visit this link.
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