Improving assessment practices for inclusivity: The impact of course wide implementation of five initiatives to improve assessment literacy and equity of opportunity for students.

  

The presentation follows a three-year project investigating ways to reduce the disparities in achievement between students entering the course from BTEC qualifications and those entering from A-levels. With a high percentage of NTU’s student body entering from BTEC or vocational backgrounds, the findings of this project are of value to anyone with a role in designing assessments or supporting students to achieve in their assessments.

Assessment literacy is vitally for the empowerment of students and the development of a confident, competent workforce (Price et al, 2012). Elkington (2020) identifies assessment literacy as a key tenet of transforming assessment to enhance student success. The QAA emphasise the importance of fostering assessment literacy as vital to developing the confident, independent learners with academic integrity (QAA, 2018).

Five initiatives aimed at improving assessment literacy for all learners were implemented:

· Development of a standardised assessment brief, mirroring the format employed on BTEC course, to enhance accessibility.

· The use of discussion board for assessment questions as a method for improving equity in the sharing of assessment information.

· Mapping Assessment methods and strategies to ensure constructive alignment and scaffolding of key skills for assessment success.

· Mentoring support for module leaders to ensure alignment of learning and assessment outcomes.

· Workshops at each level of the course to explicitly develop assessment literacy (building on the work of Smith et al. (2013).