Transcript No Slide Title

Working towards more favourable
conditions for constructive alignment
1. pre-90s CNAA concern for course design
2. early 1990s Employment Department initiatives
3. early-mid 1990s modularisation of HE curriculum
4. 1995-97 HEQC Graduate Attributes
5. 1997 Dearing - Programme Specifications,
Subject Benchmarking and Progress Files
6. 1997-2000 QAA - development of policies
7. 2000 HEIs/teachers learning how to work with policy
8. 2002 LTSN Curriculum work
Educational rationale underlying QAA policy
1 focusing attention on what students are learning
2 promoting a consistent language to discuss students’
learning
3 seeking alignment between what students are intended
to learn, the means by which learning is promoted and
the criteria on which achievement is judged
4 encouraging students to understand how, when,
what and why they are learning
Three levels of policy intervention
3 Students
personal development planning
assessment criteria
1 Teachers programme specification
intended
learning
learning
process
transcripts
learning
achieved
Subject communities:
outcomes
2 Subject
subject benchmark
limited
subject
& performance
criteria
communities benchmark information
benchmark
outcomes
in most
benchmark
statements
performance
criteria
Role of QAA policies in constructive alignment
reference
points
subject
benchmark
statements
requirements
of professional
and statutory
bodies
institutional
policies
design tools and curriculum representations
Programme Specification
* Learning Outcome
* Teaching, learning and assessment processes that
enable intended outcomes to be achieved and
demonstrated
* Curriculum structure (may include curriculum maps)
Module specifications
teaching system
what the
teacher does
learning system
what the
student does
what is actually taught and learnt
Implicit in programme specification -the need to
show how/where learning outcomes are achieved
Bench
marks
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
etc
T=taught
curriculum building blocks
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
TPA
TPA P TPA
P
1
2
TPA
TPA
TPA
TPA
3
TPA
P
4
TPA P TPA
5
TPA
TPA
6
TPA
TPA PA TPA
PA
7
TPA
TPA
TPA P TPA
8
P
etc
P= developed through practise
A=assessed
Non-aligned assessment models!
Current undgrad. model
QAA Benchmarking model
Normative rather than
criterion referenced.
Criterion referenced
Grading scale (100pt)
culturally aligned to
5 bands of honours system
Two or three grading bands.
Relationship to grading scales
and honours classification
open to interpretation
Standards represent a
configuration of learning
characteristics in which
compensation and
trade-offs are a normal
occurrence (Sadler 1987)
Standards represent achievement
evidenced against specified
criteria. Outcomes must
be satisfied in full. Compensation
not permitted?
We want to view learning
and performance holistically
Requires two stage decision making
and judgements about satisfying all
minimum criteria
Subject benchmarking provides new
opportunities for professional learning
but this is unlikely to be fully exploited
if it is perceived as a regulatory device
rather than a spur for deeper learning
about matters of educational substance
within and across disciplines.
Introduction to QAA Subject Benchmarking
special issue Quality Assurance in Education
July 2002