Binding study advice: effect of raising the standards?

The ultimate example of standard raising is to set the minimum equal to the maximum, or – put differently – to expect students to obtain all 60 first-year ECTS credits within one year. A couple of years ago this so-called nominal = normal policy was implemented at the Erasmus University Rotterdam and more recently (September 2014) also at the Erasmus MC Medical School. A prerequisite for introducing such a system is that medical schools encourage and facilitate students to meet the standard by providing feasible study programmes, student-centred learning and timely feedback on examinations, and allow compensation between exam scores. Although the effect of the nominal = normal policy on study outcomes of our medical students is not yet known, it provides a strong incentive to students whose study progress is not optimal to obtain all first-year credits within one year. Ideally, it becomes just natural to have an optimal study rate and focusing on the minimum standards required becomes pointless.