Assessment plays a vital role in higher education and is an integral element of the learning process. Recent seismic shifts in the assessment landscape mean that there has never been a more pertinent time to question its purpose as well as its place in responding to educational and societal priorities.

In 2007, a challenge was set to reframe assessment as if learning was importantLink opens in a new window. Over 15 years later, the argument that we need to ‘rethink what is being done in assessment in higher education’ is more important than ever. Questions about what assessment exists to do, who and what it serves, what type(s) of learning it promotes, remain fundamental for educational communities to address. Alongside these is the most important question of how assessment can work to enable and empower all students to achieve to the best of their abilities.

The Warwick Education Conference 2023/24 provides an opportunity for us as a community (students and staff) to add our voices and experiences to conversations occurring across the sector more widely (see Resources below). Questions we might want to explore as we come together to collectively reimagine assessment include:

• How might assessment promote equity and social justice in higher education?
• How can assessment for learning and as learning be emphasised within the curriculum?
• What is the place of assessment in the world of AI? How might generative AI be used to change assessment for the better?
• How might assessment be a vehicle for promoting sustainable development?
• How might the values of academic integrity be designed into assessment?
• How can creative and innovative assessment respond to current needs and priorities?

A special guest speaker event took place on 10th July 2024 to continue conversations on the theme of reimagining assessment:

Following the disruptions: addressing continuing issues for assessment, Prof David Boud, Deakin University Australia - find out more and access the slides from the session.