Imagining the future of educational assessment

Lessons from Queensland and other places

An overview of key issues in educational assessment with a consideration of ways to reform policy and practice for the future, including:

• Types and purposes of assessment
• The teacher’s role in assessment
• Setting learning expectations and performance standards
• Tracking student development and reporting student progress
• Quality assurance and assessment moderation.

This presentation draws on over 35 years of experience with school-based assessment in Queensland. During that time, Queensland developed a unique and successful school-based assessment externally-moderated system for high-stakes assessment at the end of secondary school. Queensland gives priority to teacher-directed assessments at all year levels.

However, assessment policy and practice have evolved everywhere, with competing and conflicting attention to evidence-based teacher-judgment and large-scale testing. Since the teacher is the key to each student’s education, how can we reconcile these trends and keep the teacher at the heart of educational assessment. What lessons can be drawn from past and present assessment policy and practice for effective teacher-focussed assessment policy and practice in the future.

Graham Maxwell is an educational consultant based in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. From 2002 to 2005 he was a Deputy Director of the Queensland Studies Authority where he was responsible for advising on curriculum and assessment policy and research and managing the statewide systems of assessment, moderation and testing.

Prior to that, he spent 30 years teaching and researching in the School of Education at the University of Queensland. His professional career began in 1962 as a secondary school teacher of mathematics and science.