PREDICTED GRADES ASSESSMENT 2020 – AN OPPORTUNITY FOR FRESH THINKING?

In a January 2020 pre-Covid blog I commented on school-leaving assessment via the anvil of terminal examinations. These examinations were  thrown into very sharp relief in recent months, in England, Ireland and at the International Baccalaureate Organisation for example, as authorities struggled to publish accurate predicted grade results for the class of 2020 in their respective jurisdictions. The arrangements around this unique assessment, necessitated by the Covid pandemic, have brought into sharp focus the fundamental questions: what, how and indeed why do we assess in the way we do, and is the whole process fit for purpose anymore?

I am happy for the class of 2020 that, at the very least, they were spared that seeming interminable May/ June period enduring sweaty school halls, boiling sunshine, sore fingers, grey invigilators, frayed nerves, butterflies in the stomach, avoidance of debriefings, putting on a brave face, and so on. But for what? For many, to attend a third level institution which, in a few years, will prepare them for the world of work and living later this century. Really?

I wrote the Irish Leaving Certificate in June 1970. Since 1970 there are few aspects of life that have not changed, some to an unimaginable degree to the observer from 1970, but not the eye-of-the-needle process of Leaving Certificate (and similar) assessment, aided and abetted also by eye-of-the-needle tertiary level entrance procedures.

Students are being assessed in the same way now as I was fifty years ago, before recent decades of exponential developments in technology and the emergence of the digital age. Can the current assessment process really be fit for purpose anymore? It rewards, over almost everything else, the ability of students to recall and their ability to write under pressure. Useful, but much more will be required of these students in order to live fulfilled and contributing lives as this century unfolds.

It is becoming ever more likely, for instance, that the knowledge, skills, and aptitudes developed through current traditional senior cycle curricula, their method of delivery and assessment, and continued to a greater or lesser extent in universities, will need significant refocus, realignment or recalibration when today’s students reach the world of (very different) work later this decade and beyond.

Different assessment paradigms for a new age are urgently required. Perhaps the recent accelerated emergence of non-school based e-learning systems, the international expansion of Nordic education strategies and systems, the brave government proposition for the future of education in India, have begun the process? Perhaps there is now the recognition that, alongside some fundamental body of knowledge, the successful individuals, and communities to which they contribute in the future, will require a raft of other competencies, intellectual, interactional and interpersonal, which are not amenable to current methods of assessment. Fresh thinking is required here.

Surely in this age when, in the end, for example, both the Irish and English government Education Departments managed, in a relatively short period, to successfully process (most) students in a completely new manner, it points to the possibility of better means of assessment being applied which could capture comprehensively the person, qualities and potential behind the student leaving secondary school.

Why not present students’ ‘readiness and willingness’ to learn, for instance, as part of a school-leaving individual’s portfolio of accomplishments, challenges and potentials. This is likely to be of considerable interest to a prospective tertiary institution, and later, employer, interested not solely in what academic knowledge a prospective employee has amassed, but rather in how they apply their knowledge and are able to work with others, are inquisitive and creative, are solution-focused, are brave, who learn from mistakes, who contribute, are ‘radiators’ rather then ‘drains’, who are confident but not arrogant and so on.

A student achieving 600+ points in the Irish Leaving Certificate or 3 or 4 As at A level clearly has shown an ability but may possess few of the other characteristics I have just mentioned. Conversely, the 400 point or 3C student may possess an abundance of these characteristics, but they did not have opportunity to show this.

An assessment process which captures both is urgently required, and in an age, where, for example, digital portfolios can be built over a whole secondary school career, surely it must be possible, if there is a willingness in Education Departments, Tertiary Institutions and Governments to ‘do right’ by our young people.