How to Help a Student Who Has Failed the Registered Dietitian Exam

We all want our dietetic interns and past students to be successful in their studies to become a registered dietitian, but so often my students report feeling a lack of support/guidance when they reach out to their preceptors/mentors/professors for help after a failed Registered Dietitian exam attempt.

One of the biggest reasons for this I find is because unless you are working with RD exam preparation in your regular day-to-day, you are luckily not aware of how much the exam has changed since you took it (most recently updated in 2022) or the best way to study for this exam. Especially before the 2017 update, the advice when it came to studying for the RD exam was:

1. Read the Jean Inman

2. Do the Inman practice questions

3. Review your notes from school and DI

4. Take exam

For the majority of students this advice no longer works as the exam focuses on so many situational questions and with exposure to exam topics being variable in each program students have a wide variety of baseline knowledge levels. Especially if your interns had school/DI during COVID this often has left them with decreased real life clinical experiences to draw from and apply to Domain 2 which is the largest portion of the exam.

So what can you do if you have a student who has recently failed the exam?

1. Remind them that the RD exam score/number of attempts has no relationship with the quality of dietitian that they will be. If you had to retake your exam or have a colleague who had to take the exam more than once, sharing their career path can be very motivating for a student.

2. Provide a safe space for them to share about their feelings post exam. One of the leading causes I see of the pass rate dropping 30% between the 1st and 2nd attempt is the stress and lack of confidence of having to retake the exam after previously failing.

3. Offer additional study support. This is going to look different for each person, but could include linking them with a study buddy, providing additional RD exam resources or offering to check in with them during their studying to keep them accountable.

4. Send them my RD Exam Prep. This course is free and covers topics including exam structure, how to make a study schedule and how to study and avoid common mistakes. This course is also a great watch if you want to improve your knowledge of the current RD exam.

For dietetic internships and coordinated program directors also think about adding in a RD Exam Prep class day! This is a class day I have done for several different programs where we will provide the RD Exam Prep class and also have a 20-30 minute Q/A and the feedback from students is always that it was so helpful. To learn more about bringing this program to your students email me at danajfryernutrition@gmail.com or visit my website to see reviews from programs I have worked with.

Making sure your students feel supported in studying for their RD exam is key to their success!