The new university regulations, and specifically the royal decree that organises university studies, represents a paradigm shift in terms of defining the educational profile of degrees. The definition introduces identification of the main learning outcomes that should be achieved by graduates of official bachelor’s and master’s degrees and doctoral programmes. These outcomes are expressed as knowledge, skills and competencies.
The first instalment of the Focus series aimed to assist universities in this definition. Clearly, the paradigm shift does not end with simply changing the definition of the educational profile. To be successful, it must be accompanied by training, assessment and certification strategies that enable students to achieve the learning outcomes, and universities to confirm they have been achieved. Focus 2 was developed with the aim of providing tools to help universities carry out all these processes.
The first part of the document focuses on describing the different purposes of learning outcome assessment and its main characteristics and elements. For the assessment of learning outcomes to be valid, all the elements of the teaching-learning process must be operationally aligned. In other words, the intended student learning outcomes, content, teaching methodologies and activities, the assessment methods and criteria must be internally consistent. Aligning all these aspects should help achieve the learning outcomes.
The central part of the document deals with how to successfully implement criteria-based assessment for courses and subjects. The first step should be to specify learning objectives, followed by drawing up the learning outcomes students are expected to achieve. At this point, teachers will be able to identify the assessment criteria that demonstrate achievement of these learning outcomes, a key point for valid assessment. Implementing the training activities and the course and subject content must match the set learning outcomes. The same applies to establishing the assessment methods, defined in the document as the tasks used to measure the degree of achievement of the learning outcomes. In this respect, establishing a rubric system based on the previously set assessment criteria can be very helpful in certifying and grading achievement.
Focus 2 introduces an essential element in the whole process: feedback to students, which is conducive to learning and essential to ensuring student-centred teaching. Feedback is also a two-way mechanism, because it allows teachers to collect comments from their students in order to better define learning outcomes and improve the implemented teaching and assessment methods.
The document also addresses the assessment of learning outcomes at the degree level and its connection with quality assurance. Obtaining information on the achievement of student learning outcomes is essential to finding out what does and does not work, identifying weaknesses in the degree programme curriculum and the learning strategy and, consequently, improving student performance.[1]
The following aspects should be considered when planning the assessment of and improving learning outcomes for education programmes:
- Identifying expected learning outcomes at programme level.
- Mapping assessment methods throughout the education programme.
- Collecting and analysing assessment results.
- Reviewing and improving the education programme.
The success of everything described so far absolutely requires the institution to have an assessment policy aligned with the new paradigm for defining university courses. Focus 2 provides ideas that universities can use in defining this policy. It recommends gradual implementation and clearly differentiates between newly created and more well-established degree programmes. The former were already born within the new paradigm, and both the definition of learning outcomes and their assessment have been gradually implemented from the outset. More caution needs to be exercised in the case of established degree programmes. While the aim is for all the education programmes in the Catalan higher education system to adapt to the new definition of their educational profile, this must be done such a way as to avoid unnecessary strain on the degree programmes. Therefore, it is best to start with a few subjects, where there is willingness on the part of the teachers and which cover as many students as possible. Based on initial experiences, the procedure can be corrected and extended to the rest of the degree subjects. The teachers involved in these first experiences can then accompany the others on the way to full implementation.
The document ends with a series of appendices listing the tools universities can use to implement their learning outcomes assessment processes and a collection of documents providing further tools and theoretical and practical guides on implementing the process.
[1] George Kuh and Stanley Ikenberry, “More Than You Think, Less Than We Need” (National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment, October 2009).