High stakes assessment policy implementation in the time of COVID-19: the case of calculated grades in Ireland

Abstract

This paper provides a perspective on the manner in which Irish post-primary teachers interpreted and implemented a set of guidelines created by the Department of Education and Skills (DES) in Ireland when faced with the cancellation of the traditional high stakes Leaving Certificate (LC) examination due to COVID-19. Subject teachers were asked to engage with a system of calculated grades whereby they would estimate a percentage mark and a class rank for each of their students before meeting with school colleagues to agree a final set of data to be submitted for national standardisation. This was a remarkable event in Irish education as teachers had never before been directly involved in assessing their own students for certification purposes. Data from a survey conducted with teachers (n = 713) show that a wide variety of evidence was used to support their judgements and that the DES guidelines were not always implemented as intended. Challenges highlighted in the paper include decision making around grade boundaries, the lack of evidence for newer subjects, negotiating with school colleagues, and anticipating the impact of national standardisation. The study findings will be of interest to future initiatives involving the professional judgement of teachers in high stakes contexts.

Keywords:

• High stakes assessment
• calculated grades
• Leaving Certificate Examination
• policy implementation
• post-primary Ireland

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Prometric Inc.

Notes on contributors

Audrey Doyle

Audrey Doyle is an assistant professor in the School of Policy and Practice in DCU. A former second-level principal of a large all-girls post-primary school in Dublin, she achieved her Ph.D. in Maynooth University in 2019. She now lectures on curriculum and assessment across a diversity of modules in DCU, contributing to the Masters in Leadership and the Doctorate in Education.

Zita Lysaght

Zita Lysaght is a member of the School of Policy and Practice and a Research Associate and member of the Advisory Board and Advisory Panel of CARPE at DCU. She coordinates and teaches classroom assessment and research methodology modules on undergraduate, masters and doctoral programmes and directs and supervises a range of research and doctoral projects.

Michael O'Leary

Michael O'Leary holds the Prometric Chair in Assessment at Dublin City University where he also directs the Centre for Assessment Research, Policy and Practice in Education (CARPE). He leads a programme of research at CARPE focused on assessment across all levels of education and in the workplace.