Project investigator: Katie Lee Bunting, Assistant Professor of Teaching, Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy
Project Description
While argued as detrimental to meaningful student learning, oppressive power dynamics remain deeply and stubbornly embedded within student assessment of learning in higher education, where educators holds much of the power over student assessment. In OSOT 511, the summative evaluation was re-designed in 2021 to actively decentre power from the educator and toward the student, offering the option between a “creative-critical project” (Kent, 2020) and a short-answer test. This project aims to explore, through Master of Occupational Therapy (MOT) student perspectives, the impact of increasing agency, choice and partnership in summative assessment of learning.
Project Questions
- How does integrating choice, creativity, and agency into a creative-critical summative assessment shape student learning and engagement?
- For students who completed the creative-critical assessment: a. Why did you choose this option? b. How did your participation in this evaluation differ from your participation in more traditional evaluations (e.g. a test, a paper) c. How did your learning from this evaluation differ from more traditional evaluations you’ve participated in? d. What aspects of this evaluation supported your learning? e. What changes would you make to this assignment to enhance it?
- For students who completed the test: a. Why did you choose this option? b. Why did you choose not to complete the artifact and paper
option? c. How did doing the test support your learning?
Impact on teaching and learning at UBC
While there are many resources at UBC and beyond on how to design more traditional means of assessment (e.g. tests, papers), there is a paucity of resources on how to design creative, student-driven, inclusive means of assessment. As such, this project will aim to publish its findings, present at higher education conferences, present through UBC CTLT initiatives, and use its findings to develop knowledge translation resources around how to design such assessments (e.g. infographic, brief video, sample assessment guidelines, sample rubrics) to be offered to the UBC community, and beyond.