scholarly journals Student ‘voice’ and higher education assessment: Is it all about the money?

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 74-90
Author(s):  
Andrew Hemming ◽  
◽  
Margaret Power ◽  

University administered Student Evaluation of Teaching surveys, while used primarily by educators and their managers to review and improve the quality of courses and teaching, can also be used by universities’ marketing campaigns and websites as a means of stressing their institution’s student friendliness and responsiveness to students’ needs. Changes in assessment practices is one way that tertiary institutions are responding to students’ preferences. However, there is a lack of understanding of the underlying factors that moderate decisions about assessment changes. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether or not a meaningful body of research concerning student ‘choice’ in higher education assessment exists, and how the extent of student ‘choice’ may change in the future. Emphasis has been placed on the assessment methods adopted in law and professional degrees in Australia. However, a broad review of international research from other relevant higher education discipline areas has also been undertaken in this paper.

2022 ◽  
pp. 253-268
Author(s):  
Jean Cushen ◽  
Lauren Durkin

This chapter evaluates the rising significance of transversal competencies and the implications for higher education assessment practices. Transversal competencies are expected to play a definitive role in future of work scenarios. This chapter evaluates the decisions and impacts surrounding the integration of transversal competencies into higher education assessments. In particular, the chapter explores the commitments and adjustments that higher education leaders must make to build the competence assessment infrastructure and supports required. The guiding role ‘student-centred learning' pedagogies can play is discussed. Relatedly, early-stage competence frameworks are offered as insight into how student-centred learning can deliver novel, active, reflective assessments that embrace competence diversity and target meaningful development. Finally, a roadmap is offered for higher education leaders to guide them in this challenging but pertinent transformation of university teaching and learning.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gavin T. L. Brown

This is an invited chapter in review. It will appear as a chapter in the forthcoming . Research Handbook on Innovations in Assessment and Feedback in Higher Education from Elgar Publishing and edited by Carol Evans and Mike Waring. All assessments are events within a process that has the goal of making decisions about instruction, learning, curriculum, students, institutions, and consequences. Three underlying disciplines (i.e., psychometrics, psychology, and sociology) inform the evaluation of assessments. Error is ubiquitous in the selection of tasks that constitute an assessment, the administration, marking, reporting, and decisions contain a non-ignorable component of error that has to be mitigated. Psychological ego factors in the marker and the assessee can be maladaptive in generating responses to assessment demands; awareness of this validity threat is needed to support participants into adaptive effort. Environments, from cultural norms to government policies, create contexts that can contribute greater error and psychological ego into the system, especially when high-stakes accountability pressures, as opposed to low-consequence formative support, are implemented. I conclude with suggestions of how integration of these underlying disciplines can improve the credibility and quality of higher education assessment.


2021 ◽  
Vol 006 (01) ◽  
pp. 40-46
Author(s):  
Muhammad Sofyan

Today, private universities are required to have competitiveness, independence, sustainable reach, integrated information network, in order to maintain the quality of higher education. In fact, not all tertiary institutions have plenty of qualified resources to meet these demands. The emergence of changes in meso policy on higher education standards (SN Dikti) became a substantial influence for private tertiary institutions. Private tertiary institutions are urged to be able to adjust even beyond the standards of tertiary institutions that have been prepared by the central government. The external environment and any amendments to regulations for higher education meso policies may affect the choice of actions and institutional decisions in the operational process of higher education in terms of adapting with and adopting institutions. Exploration of sundry field findings of this study has revealed several aspects to view, it’s how the regulations become a highly influential elements, organizational culture and work culture of other institutions, national, regional and global insights, the influence of inter-institutional cooperation, and assessment of international accreditation.


Author(s):  
Bob Uttl

AbstractIn higher education, anonymous student evaluation of teaching (SET) ratings are used to measure faculty’s teaching effectiveness and to make high-stakes decisions about hiring, firing, promotion, merit pay, and teaching awards. SET have many desirable properties: SET are quick and cheap to collect, SET means and standard deviations give aura of precision and scientific validity, and SET provide tangible seemingly objective numbers for both high-stake decisions and public accountability purposes. Unfortunately, SET as a measure of teaching effectiveness are fatally flawed. First, experts cannot agree what effective teaching is. They only agree that effective teaching ought to result in learning. Second, SET do not measure faculty’s teaching effectiveness as students do not learn more from more highly rated professors. Third, SET depend on many teaching effectiveness irrelevant factors (TEIFs) not attributable to the professor (e.g., students’ intelligence, students’ prior knowledge, class size, subject). Fourth, SET are influenced by student preference factors (SPFs) whose consideration violates human rights legislation (e.g., ethnicity, accent). Fifth, SET are easily manipulated by chocolates, course easiness, and other incentives. However, student ratings of professors can be used for very limited purposes such as formative feedback and raising alarm about ineffective teaching practices.


2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 298-307
Author(s):  
Fatima Zahra SOUBHI ◽  
Mohammed Aitdaoud ◽  
Laurent Lima ◽  
Mohammed Talbi

  Abstract The evolution of teaching is currently considered a very important task, both from an institutional and a moral viewpoint. The evaluation of such a domain, and its conduct, has been reported by several research studies in the literature. “Who? What? How? Drawing from which references? Which clues? Should the people assessed take part in the process? To what extent should the results be publicized?” (Demailly, 2001). For that reason, we will first draw some guidelines for the evaluation of teaching and try to define its possible objectives. Three main domains may be contemplated: teachers’ activity (teaching), the learning process (learning), and the effects of the teaching/learning process. These draw upon an enquiry carried out in three different faculties by our research team. This study is related to the VOLUBILIS project "Moroccan and European students: a comparative approach”, which aims to identify the challenges and expectations of Moroccan students. The purpose of this research is to indicate how students at Hassan II University of Casablanca judge the quality of their studies. We will be able to show that an evaluation of courses by students is both possible and profitable. As a matter of fact, this enquiry has brought up valuable information about higher education pedagogy that concerns the three fields mentioned earlier, and it also offer some suggestions to generate improvements. Keywords: evaluation, teaching, students, quality, higher education, ACP.    


Author(s):  
Indo Benna

Higher education in many developing countries faces the triple challenges of inadequate funding, need to improve quality of learning outcomes, and the pressure to increase quality of graduates. Crowdsourcing offers opportunity for institutions to face these problems with little resource expenditure. The chapter describes/analyzes how crowdsourcing can be applied in curriculum and teaching material development activities through collaborative efforts of higher education institutions from different parts of the world to develop suitable curriculum for teaching English for specific purpose. The chapter analyzes the process and the evaluates the outcome of the crowdsourcing tool and suggests that its application can keep higher education institutions in developing countries in forefront of education and research innovation, and prepares members in these institutions for innovative problem solving and for the challenges of the online world.


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