R Score

R score at Cégep à distance

For admission to limited enrolment programs, most Québec universities use the R score as the method for ranking academic results. R scores are calculated four times a year by the Ministère de l’Enseignement supérieur (MES) and may change with each calculation. Students can find out their R score by asking an academic advisor or academic information technician.

Calculating the R score

To determine a student’s R score, the MES uses the results of students in the same evaluation group, as submitted by Cégep à distance. This “evaluation group” includes all students who took the course in that year and session and who were evaluated in the same way. This procedure, which was established by the MES, has been in effect ever since the Collège de Rosemont first took responsibility for distance education through Cégep à distance, in 1991.

The MES does its own calculations to set an average – different from the one that appears on your Cégep à distance transcript – and calculate the R score. It is important not to confuse the “evaluation group” sent to the MES to calculate the R score and the “group average” indicated on your student transcript.

The MES does not use the average shown on your transcript to calculate the R score.

For the purposes of R score calculation, Cégep à distance uses the definition for “evaluation group” shown on the CRÉPUQ website. For further details on R scores, please go to the BCI website, especially the document called “Questions and Answers about the College R Score.”

The average shown on your Cégep à distance transcript is the student average for the previous year.

This grade, which has no impact on your R score, just gives you an indication of how your grade compares with other students who were evaluated on the same course in the same way.  Cégep à distance has established the validity of this method by verifying the stability of group averages from year to year, through a high number of students.

Cégep à distance uses a “continuous registration and variable completion” method of registration, which means that we enrol new students all the time and they have up to nine months to complete their courses, at their own pace. Naturally, they complete the courses at very different times.

If we used the real group average as soon as each student in the group finished the course, the average would fluctuate depending on how many students had finished, so each transcript would show a different group average for the same course in the same session. You have to admit that would be strange!

Another option would be to wait until all the students taking the course had finished before issuing the transcripts, since the actual group average can’t be calculated until the last student has completely finished the course. But that would run counter to our stated goals of helping students complete their education faster and processing student records faster.

Using the group average from the previous year allows us to:

• Give the students who finish first a group average that reflects the average performance of a group, and not just of a few individuals
• Issue transcripts promptly, rather than waiting for everyone to finish the session

This solution, which differentiates the “evaluation group” submitted to the MES for the R score and the “group average,” has the double advantage of not penalizing students who need a transcript quickly and not affecting the R score.