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Student Assessment Research

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Assessors Awards

In the U.K., teaching staff in further/higher education are required to undertake a qualification, or perhaps a series of qualifications called the TDLB assessor awards. - D32, D33 etc. etc.

Teaching staff, who teach adults ( ie. post 16 and some school children), are required to have this qualification in order to, being brief, ensure a standardisation in the level of assessed attainment (demonstrated competence).

I recently completed a D32/33 which took me ( and 30 other colleagues with a variety of teaching experience ) a total of 7 taught hours and, in my case, about 20 hours of "portfolio building" which involved gathering "evidence" as witness of my competence to assess students against written "learning outcomes", and within the defined context of the support structure(s) provided by the college. My portfolio amounted to a ring binder fairly well filled. The training was provided by a private training company.

A colleague ( with more teaching experience than I ) and her cohort of teaching staff, also doing the D32/33, began in September 1997. They finished the course in July 1998 having attended many taught sessions and having attended numerous tutorials ( many of which were contradictory ). Her portfolio was huge, amounting to a full lever-arch folder stuffed to the brim. All in all, a huge commitment in time and effort, but nothing compared to other (equally experienced) colleagues who took 2 years to complete the same qualification, and who's portfolios amounted to 2 or more lever arch binders full of "evidence". All of these staff were 'trained' by staff from a local F.E. college.

Now, let's just think a minute. These qualifications are intended to ensure a standardisation in the levels of competence in assessing amongst teaching staff, and therefore of student assessment, on a national basis.

Something is not working in a big way. Clearly, massive differences exist in the teaching input for staff groups of roughly equal diversity and ability, and in the nature and extent of the "evidence" required by different training providors to define evidence of competence.

But how can this be? The whole purpose of the exercise is to create a standardisation. The people delivering the courses are "expert" in the delivery of the material, and in the assessment requirements. This method of assessment ( portfolio building ) is what they profess to be expert at, yet such differences in the training provision and the assessment requirements of teaching staff exist.

It appears to me that, as I suspected back in 1989, 'authentic measurment' involving the creation and marking of 'portfolios of evidence' is open to arbitary interpretation of the learning objectives and performance criteria - very similar accusations to those which were levelled at the 'traditional' education/training system some 10-15 years ago, and which lead to the tidal wave of change that has disrupted teaching and learning ever since.