‘I’m an assessment illiterate’: towards a shared discourse of assessment literacy for external examiners

Abstract

The quality assurance ‘regime’ that spans the higher education sector internationally is underpinned by a number of unchallenged assumptions. Nowhere is this more apparent than within the external examiner system in the UK, an instrument for the professional self-regulation of higher education. One such assumption is that external examiners are assessment literate. Within higher education assessment literacy is a concept in its infancy, but one that has the capacity to reverse the deterioration of confidence in academic standards. Whilst the concept is becoming integrated into the sectorial vernacular, its fluid and negotiated nature is under-conceptualised. The primary aim of this article lies in investigating the extent of external examiners’ assessment literacy and to use this as a base to initiate a discussion surrounding the development of a shared discourse of assessment literacy, thereby providing a tool for greater conceptualisation.

Keywords:

• assessment literacy
• external examiners
• quality assurance
• shared discourse
• higher education

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank all of the external examiners who agreed to take part in the research; the institutional administrators who provided access to these external examiners; the project mentor, Professor Sue Bloxham, who supported the development and dissemination of the findings, and; the Society for Research into Higher Education (SRHE) without whose support the research would not have been possible.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Society for Research into Higher Education (SRHE) under Grant (Ref: NR2015/15).