<p>Departmental exams show who is not teaching the materials as outlined by the curriculum. Or at least not teaching them well. The answer is not for the profs to be making up their own exams. If you are taking certain courses, there are certain things you absolutely need to know well in order to build a solid foundation for future courses. Premed students can really be in trouble when taking MCATS if the professor did not cover what is presumed was covered. </p>
<p>I know that at some schools, the % of kids who fail the exams is examined and the whoever is teaching a section with bad stats, is warned that the material covered by him/her is not adequate for the students to pass. This is especially relevant if the students who are doing poorly on the exam are doing well on other aspects of the course. </p>
<p>Nearly all of my oldest son’s final exams which were responsible for 60% of the grade, were departmental. This allowed the department to pass those who met department standards, not someone who could pass a test his teacher happened to use covering what that teacher covered.</p>
<p>If you are teaching a seminar course or other type of course that does not have essential information that needs to be covered, it is not an issue. You can pick what you cover in the course and what you want to test. But for some subjects there is not that luxury.</p>