Expert advice propels project towards more inclusive exam designs
April 7, 2021
How would you provoke change to improve the inclusivity of exams? Our research team recently took this question to our project’s advisory group: Matt Brett (Deakin University), Professor Phillip Dawson (Deakin University), Susan Grimes (University of Newcastle), Merrin McCracken (Deakin University), Cate Rooney (CQUniversity), and Professor Denise Wood (University of the Sunshine Coast). As our workshops with students with disabilities (SWDs), unit coordinators, and disability support staff had already identified many challenges to improving practice, we were particularly interested in drawing on the advisory group’s collective wisdom to get ideas for creating change, both at a unit level and across the wider university.
Our discussion centred around several key messages. First was the importance of using universal design for learning principles as a starting place. The discussion highlighted the diverse nature and complex needs of SWDs and how students in this group often carry additional markers of disadvantage (e.g., low socio-economic status, regional/remote), making holistic support important.
We also explored practical considerations associated with change. One was staff workload and the need to make it as easy as possible for staff to be aware of and support students with disabilities, ideally via digital systems available to all members of the teaching team, while still maintaining appropriate levels of student confidentiality. The group also suggested considering how templates currently used for assessment design and review could be redesigned to prompt staff to carefully consider the inclusivity of their proposed assessment. Such templates could also include prompting to encourage staff to think about whether information relating to the assessment task, and associated support, is communicated to students in ways which diverse students can access. Peers and mentors were discussed as groups which may help improve student awareness of support.
To provoke change, the group had several key suggestions. First was to focus teaching staff on the importance of authenticity of tasks to the real world, as this may help people naturally move away from traditional exams. As many staff continue to use in-person, invigilated exams as a way to minimise cheating (e.g., sharing answers with peers, accessing contract cheating sites, having another person complete the assessment), progress is unlikely without considering further how to best encourage student academic integrity and clearly communicating the consequences of dishonest practices.
Finally, it is worth considering further the ways new technologies may make it possible to better authenticate authorship of assessments which are not conducted in-person, and how changes in Learning Management Systems may provide new and exciting formats of assessment which offer students the flexibility and conditions they need to successfully demonstrate their learning. Moreover, such university-wide changes were identified as an opportunity to strengthen an institution’s inclusive assessment practices overall.
Armed with these good ideas, the project team is excited to explore further how these can be actioned in the final three project workshops.
Posted by Lois Harris and Joanne Dargusch