Investigating student preparedness for holistic competency assessment: insights from the Hong Kong context

Abstract

In recent years, there have been increasing efforts to formally assess holistic competencies. These efforts tend to be policy and expert driven, overlooking students’ subjectivities in being assessed. Questions remain about how prepared students are for holistic competency assessment. To address this research gap, we conducted 2150 surveys and 17 focus group interviews (N = 73) with Hong Kong university students, attempting to understand their level of preparedness through the lens of student assessment literacy. Findings suggest that while students may be reasonably prepared for holistic competency assessment, they also raise a range of issues that require further deliberation in assessment planning (e.g. how to report assessment results; the form of support provided to students; democratising the assessment process).

Keywords:

• Holistic competency
• generic skills
• transferable skills
• assessment literacy
• student perceptions

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Dr. Cecilia Ka Yuk Chan is the Head of Professional Development and an Associate Professor at the Centre for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning at the University of Hong Kong. Cecilia has dual discipline expertise in engineering and education as well as rich experiences in research, training and teaching. Her research areas include holistic competency development, assessment in higher education and engineering education.

Jiahui Luo is a PhD student at the Centre for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning, the University of Hong Kong. She holds an MPhil degree in education from the University of Cambridge, UK. Her research interests include assessment and feedback in higher education and holistic competency development.

Additional information

Funding

The research described in this article was funded through the General Research Fund (No. 17200720) of the Hong Kong Research Grants Council and the University Grants Committee of Hong Kong.