Advances and Innovations in University Assessment and Feedback

Our understanding of the purposes of assessment and the nature of assessment practices in higher education has changed markedly over the past forty years. These changes are a response not only to recent developments in our conceptualisations of student learning but also to the demands a rapidly changing and increasingly complex world places on students. This book contains new perspectives on assessment and feedback provided by world renowned researchers on issues that are currently of great interest to both academic managers and teaching staff, as they try to make courses more effective and more appealing at a time when universities compete for incoming students. Rather than simply sharing recent inventions in assessment and feedback, the contributors to this book highlight the linkages between these innovations and new theorising and empirical research on assessment and student learning, thereby offering practices that are not only pioneering but evidence-based.

About the Author:

Carolin Kreber is Professor of Higher Education at the University of Edinburgh, where she is also Director of the Higher Education Research Group. A recent book explores teaching and learning in higher education through the lens of authenticity (Authenticity in and through teaching in higher education, Routledge, 2013). Present work is concerned with professional learning within the academy, interpretations of professionalism, and preparation for practice to create a more just and sustainable future.

Charles Anderson is a Senior Lecturer and Deputy Head of the Institute for Education, Community and Society at the University of Edinburgh. His research has ranged over a number of aspects of higher education and secondary school education, while maintaining a central focus on textual practices and on communication.

Noel Entwistle is Professor Emeritus of Education at the University of Edinburgh and has been the Editor of the British Journal of Educational Psychology and of Higher Education. He has honorary degrees from the Universities of Gothenburg and Turku, and holds an Oeuvre Award from the European Association for Research in Learning and Instruction. His main research interests continue to be in student learning and understanding at university level. He is a Co-Editor of a Palgrave Macmillan series on Universities in the 21st Century and recent publications include Student Learning and University Teaching (editor, BJEP, 2007), Teaching for Understanding at University (Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), along with a chapter in Enhancing the Quality of Learning (CUP, 2012).

Jan McArthur is a Lecturer in Higher Education at the University of Edinburgh. She holds a PhD in Educational Research from Lancaster University and has taught in higher education in both Australia and the United Kingdom. Her research interests span the nature and purposes of higher education, social justice within and through higher education and dialogue/student voice within assessment, learning and feedback. She has a particular interest in critical theory, and its applications to higher education research and practice, and especially the work of Theodor Adorno, as demonstrated in her recent book: Rethinking Knowledge within Higher Education: Adorno and Social Justice.