As of 2013, the Brazilian Association of Medical Education (ABEM, Associação Brasileira de Educação Médica) started to encourage the use of the Progress Test in a more widespread way in different regions of Brazil, by promoting the creation of regional centers that apply the test annually in a regionalized way. Currently, 18 centers have been implemented, of which more than 220 Brazilian medical schools participate.

In 2015, ABEM proposed a project aiming to encourage Brazilian schools to adopt the Progress Test (PT) as a strategy to evaluate the cognitive domain of the expected competence for the practice of Medicine¹. As a result, the first national test was held in this year, with the participation of 58 schools and 23,065 students².

The PT situates students in their evolutionary process and promotes opportunities for reflection and learning (training function). The performance in standardized progress tests can promote the improvement in academic performance based on the capacity for self-regulation and metacognition, in addition to the student's critical thinking³. It can also be used as an external assessment of the disciplines and clerkships, with the purpose of decision-making (summative function), as well as allowing the institution to carry out the diagnosis of strengths and gaps in the curricular structure (informative or diagnostic function)⁴. Participating in the preparation of the test is a unique opportunity for Faculty development in good practices on item writing in the format of single best answer.

As of 2019, ABEM resumed the process of consolidating the national PT with a view to institutionalizing a process directed and organized by ABEM itself and its regional consortia, on an annual basis, without a classificatory nature. In 2021, the second national PT took place, in an unprecedented online format, which was performed by approximately 50,000 students from 130 medical schools⁵.

ABEM has directed its efforts to strengthen this initiative, seeking its improvement, expansion and consolidation. The construction of the national PT has allowed the creation of collaborative work and research networks, either by bringing together individuals with common interests or the creation of true communities of practice.

Based on these two moments, in July 2022, ABEM held the first national workshop on the PT, in the city of São Paulo. Among the objectives of this event, it is worth mentioning: acknowledgement of the different initiatives to apply the PT in Brazil and in the world. The main results of the second national PT, applied in the previous year, were presented and discussed, with the consequent assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the process. The ABEM PT platform was introduced. In discussion groups and plenary sessions, a series of proposals were made and, at the end, perspectives and expectations for the next stages of the project were aligned and agreed. At the time, the Board of Directors and Directors of ABEM were present, as well as representatives from most of the progress test centers: Sul I - Gaúcho; Sul II - Núcleo de Apoio Pedagógico Interinstitucional Sul II (Napisul II) and Novo Sul; RJ/ES - RJ/ES; SP - Núcleo Interinstitucional de Estudos e Práticas de Avaliação em Educação Médica (Niepaem), Caipira, Paulista I, II e III; MG - Comissão do Consórcio Mineiro do Teste de Progresso (TEP Minas I and TEP Minas III); NE I - Alagoas and Baiano; NE II - Consórcio Interinstitucional Nordeste I (CIN I) and Consórcio Interinstitucional Nordeste II (CIN II); CO 1 - Centro-Oeste.

Some of the directions of the workshop were the strengthening of the project through the support of ABEM and its regional offices, the valorization of the regionalized centers, the inclusion and equal qualification of the actors that contributed to the national test, broad student involvement, improvement of the test analysis and the reports produced for schools and individually for the students, ensuring financial sustainability, and encouraging research and dissemination of knowledges and information produced from this experience.

Based on the workshop, ABEM decided to open a public call for this supplement by the Brazilian Journal of Medical Education (RBEM, Revista Brasileira de Educação Médica), whose topic is: Progress Test: advances and prospects in Medical Education. The objective of this publication is to publicize successful initiatives involving the performance of the PT, recognizing and valuing the experiences, especially in the national scenario. Hence, we expect to support the development of new initiatives considering the challenges, potentialities and impacts of the PT on undergraduate training and also on medical residency. The thematic lines were: the PT in undergraduate school; the PT in medical residency; impact of the PT on the management of undergraduate and residency courses; formative assessment mediated by the PT and teacher development for carrying out the PT. The possible article models included original quantitative and qualitative studies and experience reports.

A total of 15 articles were submitted for this special issue and sent to the reviewers, of which 11 were accepted, following the usual editorial process of the journal (double-blind review). Of these, six are experience reports and the other five original studies. The addressed topics included: the impact of PT on the medical course, analyzed from the performance of students and the analysis of its effects at school (two original articles and one experience report); the students' perception of the PT (an original article); the quality of the test items as a strategy that supports teacher development and the search for excellence (an original article); one experience report of a consortium in the northeast region of Brazil; the PT as a predictive tool of performance in medical residency selection and as a tool for the board certification of the title of specialist in Gynecology and Obstetrics (one original article and one experience report); and finally, the use of the PT as a management and evaluation tool for educational programs (curricular change) in undergraduate medical school and in GO residency (one original article and two experience reports).

We hope that the material published in this thematic issue will inspire and encourage the development of new initiatives related to the PT and strengthen the existing ones in the different contexts, medical undergraduate school and medical residency, at the national level.

We wish you all a good read.