Project overview
The Assessment Centre of Excellence (ACE) is funded from September 2024 to July 2026 as part of Oxford’s Digital Transformation. The initiative involves colleagues from across the University, including the Centre for Teaching and Learning, Education Policy Support, and Student Assessment Team and aims to enhance assessment practices, policy and processes, ensuring they are accessible, inclusive and clear for all staff and students.
The project aims to support the Education Committee’s ambition to diversify summative assessment tasks; review assessment-related policy and support reduction in administration burden. This will be delivered through two goals:
- Increasing the number of courses with inclusive assessments
- Improving operational administration of assessments end to end and relevant policies. (Reducing workload burdens on examiners and professional support staff)
Each goal is underpinned by a number of priorities which will shape the programme of work. See the priorities and deliverables section for more detail on these.
Timeline and next steps
During Trinity term 2025 and the long vacation, the focus of work will be:
- Continuing to increase the number of course teams in the (re)designing assessment consultancy service
- Developing resources to support AI in assessment
- Mapping all policy, process and guidance related to assessment
- Surveying key stakeholders to identify different forms of support for Inspera users
- Scoping an assessment portal (‘one stop shop’) that signposts resources and information on assessment for staff
Priorities and deliverables
With the goal of increasing the number of courses with inclusive assessments the project will:
- Increase number of courses and programmes adopting a diverse range of inclusive assessments tasks, conditions and timings
- Maximise usability of digital assessment tools
- Embed inclusive assessment practices and systematically anticipate disabled students’ needs, as stated in the APP
- Support the development of policy on AI use in assessment, supported by development of resources for staff and students
With the goal of improving operational administration of assessments end to end, the project will:
- Clarify policy architecture: regulation; policy; process to reduce confusion and improve operational efficiencies. Review content of assessment guidance and policy documentation
- Develop an interactive tool that allows users to navigate and understand the full annual assessment timeline
- Support staff involved in supporting assessments to create collaborative networks to share practice
Contact info
If you have any questions about the project, you can contact the team via the Centre of Learning at contact@ctl.ox.ac.uk.
