Investigating The Undergraduate Experience Of Assessment In Higher Education

This paper reports on the preliminary findings of a doctoral study in progress, which issituated in the context of quality in higher education, and is premised on the view that thestudent learning experience is ultimately the most meaningful and lasting measure ofacademic quality. The literature on assessment in higher education clearly placesassessment at the heart of student learning and it is claimed that “the truth about aneducational system” may be discovered by examining its assessment procedures(Rowntree, 1987, p.1). Using a qualitative case study approach, the study aims to revealthe values inherent in assessment, to show how these are conveyed through institutionaldiscourses and through practices of lecturers, and how students’ learning behaviour maybe affected by their perspectives of assessment. Data gathering activities for the entiredoctoral research include focus group discussions and individual interviews with finalyearundergraduates, interviews with their lecturers, observations of lectures andclassroom assessments, examination of documents related to the course descriptions andassessment, as well as a study of the administrative and procedural aspects of assessmentwhich are part of the assessment praxis. The emerging themes reported here, based solelyon the analysis of two of the focus group discussions, indicate how assessment praxis inhigher education seems to be a reproduction of dominant power structures that haveinculcated patterns of student passivity in learning. This has serious implications for the university’s agenda for transformation, and broadly, the shaping of participatory democracy in citizenry.