what does coursework assessment mean

Course Assessment

Course-level assessment is a process of systematically examining and refining the fit between the course activities and what students should know at the end of the course.

Conducting a course-level assessment involves considering whether all aspects of the course align with each other and whether they guide students to achieve the desired learning outcomes.

“Assessment” refers to a variety of processes for gathering, analyzing, and using information about student learning to support instructional decision-making, with the goal of improving student learning. Most instructors already engage in assessment processes all the time, ranging from informal (“hmm, there are many confused faces right now- I should stop for questions”) to formal (“nearly half the class got this quiz question wrong- I should revisit this concept”).

When approached in a formalized way, course-level assessment is a process of systematically examining and refining the fit between the course activities and what students should know at the end of the course. Conducting a course-level assessment involves considering whether all aspects of the course align with each other and whether they guide students to achieve the desired learning outcomes . Course-level assessment can be a practical process embedded within course design and teaching, that provides substantial benefits to instructors and students.

Over time, as the process is followed iteratively over several semesters, it can help instructors find a variety of pathways to designing more equitable courses in which more learners develop greater expertise in the skills and knowledge of greatest importance to the discipline or topic of the course.

Differentiating Grading from Assessment

“Assessment” is sometimes used colloquially to mean “grading,” but there are distinctions between the two. Grading is a process of evaluating individual student learning for the purposes of characterizing that student’s level of success at a particular task (or the entire course). The grade of an assignment may provide feedback to students on which concepts or skills they have mastered, which can guide them to revise their study approach, but may not be used by the instructor to decide how subsequent class sessions will be spent. Similarly, a student’s grade in a course might convey to other instructors in the curriculum or prospective employers the level of mastery that the student has demonstrated during that semester, but need not suggest changes to the design of the course as a whole for future iterations.

In contrast to grading, assessment practices focus on determining how many students achieved which learning course outcomes, and to what level of mastery, for the purpose of helping the instructor revise subsequent lessons or the course as a whole for subsequent terms. Since final course grades may include participation points, and aggregate student mastery of all course learning objectives into a single measure, they rarely give clarity on what elements of the course have been most or least successful in achieving the instructor’s goals. Differentiating assessment from grading allows instructors to plot a clear course forward toward making the changes that will have the greatest impact in the areas they define as being most important, based on the results of the assessment.

Course learning outcomes are measurable statements that describe what students should be able to do by the end of a course . Let’s parse this statement into its three component parts: student-centered, measurable, and course-level.

Student-Centered

First, learning outcomes should focus on what students will be able to do, not what the course will do. For example:

• “Introduces the fundamental ideas of computing and the principles of programming” says what a course is intended to accomplish. This is perfectly appropriate for a course description but is not a learning outcome.
• A related student learning outcome might read, “ Explain the fundamental ideas of computing and identify the principles of programming.”

Second, learning outcomes are measurable , which means that you can observe the student performing the skill or task and determine the degree to which they have done so. This does not need to be measured in quantitative terms—student learning can be observed in the characteristics of presentations, essays, projects, and many other student products created in a course (discussed more in the section on rubrics below).

To be measurable, learning outcomes should not include words like understand , learn , and appreciate , because these qualities occur within the student’s mind and are not observable. Rather, ask yourself, “What would a student be doing if they understand, have learned, or appreciate?” For example:

• “Learners should understand US political ideologies regarding social and environmental issues,” is not observable.
• “Learners should be able to compare and contrast U.S. political ideologies regarding social and environmental issues,” is observable.

Course-Level

Finally, learning outcomes for course-level assessment focus on the knowledge and skills that learners will take away from a course as a whole. Though the final project, essay, or other assessment that will be used to measure student learning may match the outcome well, the learning outcome should articulate the overarching takeaway from the course, rather than describing the assignment. For example:

• “Identify learning principles and theories in real-world situations” is a learning outcome that describes skills learners will use beyond the course.
• “Develop a case study in which you document a learner in a real-world setting” describes a course assignment aligned with that outcome but is not a learning outcome itself.

Identify and Prioritize Your Higher-Order End Goals

Course-level learning outcomes articulate the big-picture takeaways of the course, providing context and purpose for day-to-day learning. To keep the workload of course assessment manageable, focus on no more than 5-10 learning outcomes per course (McCourt, 2007). This limit is helpful because each of these course-level learning objectives will be carefully assessed at the end of the term and used to guide iterative revision of the course in future semesters.

This is not meant to suggest that students will only learn 5-10 skills or concepts during the term. Multiple shorter-term and lower-level learning objectives are very helpful to guide student learning at the unit, week, or even class session scale (Felder & Brent, 2016). These shorter-term objectives build toward or serve as components of the course-level objectives.

Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001) is a helpful tool for deciding which of your objectives are course-level, which may be unit-to class-level objectives, and how they fit together. This taxonomy organizes action verbs by complexity of thinking, resulting in the following categories:

Download a list of sample learning outcomes from a variety of disciplines .

Typically, objectives at the higher end of the spectrum (“analyzing,” “evaluating,” or “creating”) are ideal course-level learning outcomes, while those at the lower end of the spectrum (“remembering,” “understanding,” or “applying”) are component parts and day, week, or unit-level outcomes. Lower-level outcomes that do not contribute substantially to students’ ability to achieve the higher-level objectives may fit better in a different course in the curriculum.

Consider Involving Your Learners

Depending on the course and the flexibility of the course structure and/or progression, some educators spend the first day of the course working with learners to craft or edit learning outcomes together. This practice of giving learners an informed voice may lead to increased motivation and ownership of learning.

Alignment, where all components work together to bolster specific student learning outcomes, occurs at multiple levels. At the course level, assignments or activities within the course are aligned with the daily or unit-level learning outcomes, which in turn are aligned with the course-level objectives. At the next level, the learning outcomes of each course in a curriculum contribute directly and strategically to programmatic learning outcomes.

Alignment Within the Course

Since learning outcomes are statements about key learning takeaways, they can be used to focus the assignments, activities, and content of the course (Wiggins & McTighe, 2005). Biggs & Tang (2011) note that, “In a constructively aligned system, all components… support each other, so the learner is enveloped within a supportive learning system.”

For example, for the learning outcome, “learners should be able to collaborate effectively on a team to create a marketing campaign for a product,” the course should: (1) intentionally teach learners effective ways to collaborate on a team and how to create a marketing campaign; (2) include activities that allow learners to practice and progress in their skillsets for collaboration and creation of marketing campaigns; and (3) have assessments that provide feedback to the learners on the extent that they are meeting these learning outcomes.

Alignment With Program

When developing your course learning outcomes, consider how the course contributes to your program’s mission/goals (especially if such decisions have not already been made at the programmatic level). If course learning outcomes are set at the programmatic level, familiarize yourself with possible program sequences to understand the knowledge and skills learners are bringing into your course and the level and type of mastery they may need for future courses and experiences. Explicitly sharing your understanding of this alignment with learners may help motivate them and provide more context, significance, and/or impact for their learning (Cuevas, Matveevm, & Miller, 2010).

If relevant, you will also want to ensure that a course with NUpath attributes addresses the associated outcomes . Similarly, for undergraduate or graduate courses that meet requirements set by external evaluators specific to the discipline or field, reviewing and assessing these outcomes is often a requirement for continuing accreditation.

See our program-level assessment guide for more information.

Transparency

Sharing course learning outcomes with learners makes the benchmarks for learning explicit and helps learners make connections across different elements within the course (Cuevas & Mativeev, 2010). Consider including course learning outcomes in your syllabus , so learners know what is expected of them by the end of a course and can refer to the outcomes as the term progresses. When educators refer to learning outcomes during the course before introducing new concepts or assignments, learners receive the message that the outcomes are important and are more likely to see the connections between the outcomes and course activities.

Formative Assessment

Formative assessment practices are brief, often low-stakes (minimal grade value) assignments administered during the semester to give the instructor insight into student progress toward one or more course-level learning objectives (or the day-to unit-level objectives that stair-step toward the course objectives). Common formative assessment techniques include classroom discussions , just-in-time quizzes or polls , concept maps , and informal writing techniques like minute papers or “muddiest points,” among many others (Angelo & Cross, 1993).

Refining Alignment During the Semester

While it requires a bit of flexibility built into the syllabus, student-centered courses often use the results of formative assessments in real time to revise upcoming learning activities. If students are struggling with a particular outcome, extra time might be devoted to related practice. Alternatively, if students demonstrate accomplishment of a particular outcome early in the related unit, the instructor might choose to skip activities planned to teach that outcome and jump ahead to activities related to an outcome that builds upon the first one.

Supporting Student Motivation and Engagement

Formative assessment and subsequent refinements to alignment that support student learning can be transformative for student motivation and engagement in the course, with the greatest benefits likely for novices and students worried about their ability to successfully accomplish the course outcomes, such as those impacted by stereotype threat (Steele, 2010). Take the example below, in which an instructor who sees that students are struggling decides to dedicate more time and learning activities to that outcome. If that instructor were to instead move on to instruction and activities that built upon the prior learning objective, students who did not reach the prior objective would become increasingly lost, likely recognize that their efforts at learning the new content or skill were not helping them succeed, and potentially disengage from the course as a whole.

Artifacts for Summative Assessment

To determine the degree to which students have accomplished the course learning outcomes, instructors often assign some form of project , essay, presentation, portfolio, renewable assignment , or other cumulative final. The final product of these activities could serve as the “artifact” that is assessed. In this context, alignment is particularly critical—if this assignment does not adequately guide students to demonstrate their achievement of the learning outcomes, the instructor will not have concrete information to guide course design for future semesters. To keep assessment manageable, aim to design a single final assignment that create the space for students to demonstrate their performance on multiple (if not all) course learning outcomes.

Since not all courses are designed with a final assignment that allows students to demonstrate their highest level of achievement of all course learning outcomes, the assessment processes could use the course assignment that represents the highest level of achievement that students had an opportunity to demonstrate during the term. However, some learning objectives that do not come into play during the final may be better categorized as unit-level, rather than course-level, objectives.

Direct vs. Indirect Measures of Student Learning

Some instructors also use surveys, interviews, or other methods that ask learners whether and how they believe they have achieved the learning outcomes. This type of “indirect evidence” can provide valuable information about how learners understand their progress but does not directly measure students’ learning. In fact, novices commonly have difficulty accurately evaluating their own learning (Ambrose et al., 2010). For this reason, indirect evidence of student learning (on its own) is not considered sufficient for summative assessment.

Together, direct and indirect evidence of student learning can help an instructor determine whether to bolster student practice in certain areas or whether to simply focus on increasing transparency about when students are working toward which learning outcome.

Creating and Assessing Student Work with Analytic Rubrics

One tool for assessing student work is analytic rubrics (shown below) which are matrices of characteristics and descriptions of what it might look like for student products to demonstrate these characteristics at different levels of mastery. Analytic rubrics are commonly recommended for assessment purposes, since they provide more detailed feedback to guide course design in more meaningful ways than holistic rubrics. Pre-existing analytic rubrics such as the AAC&U VALUE Rubrics can be tailored to fit your course or program, or you can develop an outcome-specific rubric yourself (Moskal, 2000 is a useful reference, or contact CATLR for a one-on-one consultation). The process of refining a rubric often involves multiple iterations of applying the rubric to student work and identifying the ways in which it captures or does not capture the characteristics representing the outcome.

Summative assessment results can inform changes to any of the course components for subsequent terms. If students have underperformed on a particular course learning objective, the instructor might choose to revise the related assignments or provide additional practice opportunities related to that objective, and formative assessments might be revised or implemented to test whether those new learning activities are producing better results. If the final assessment does not provide sufficient information about student performance on a certain outcome, the instructor might revise the assessment guidelines or even implement a different assessment that is more aligned to the outcome. Finally, if an instructor notices during the assessment process that an important outcome has not been articulated, or would be more clearly stated a different way, that instructor might revise the objectives themselves.

For assistance at any stage of the course assessment cycle, contact CATLR for a one-on-one or group consultation.

Ambrose, S. A., Bridges, M. W., DiPietro, M., Lovett, M. C., & Norman, M. K. (2010).  How learning works: Seven research-based principles for smart teaching . San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons.

Anderson, L. W., & Krathwohl, D. R. (2001).  A taxonomy for learning, teaching and assessing: A revision of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives . New York, NY: Longman.

Bembenutty, H. (2011). Self-regulation of learning in postsecondary education.  New Directions for Teaching and Learning ,  126 , 3-8. doi: 10.1002/tl.439

Biggs, J., & Tang, C. (2011).  Teaching for Quality Learning at University . Maidenhead, England: Society for Research into Higher Education & Open University Press.

Cauley, K. M., & McMillan, J. H. (2010). Formative assessment techniques to support student motivation and achievement.  The Clearing House: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues and Ideas ,  83 (1), 1-6. doi: 10.1080/00098650903267784

Cuevas, N. M., Matveev, A. G., & Miller, K. O. (2010). Mapping general education outcomes in the major: Intentionality and transparency.  Peer Review ,  12 (1), 10-15.

Felder, R. M., & Brent, R. (2016).  Teaching and learning STEM: A practical guide . San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons.

Krathwohl, D. R. (2002). A revision of Bloom’s taxonomy: An overview.  Theory into practice ,  41 (4), 212-218. doi:  10.1207/s15430421tip4104_2

McCourt, Millis, B. J., (2007).  Writing and Assessing Course-Level Student Learning Outcomes . Office of Planning and Assessment at the Texas Tech University.

Moskal, B. M. (2000). Scoring rubrics: What, when and how?  Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation ,  7 (3).

Setting Learning Outcomes . (2012). Center for Teaching Excellence at Cornell University. Retrieved from  https://teaching.cornell.edu/teaching-resources/designing-your-course/setting-learning-outcomes .

Steele, C. M. (2010).  Whistling Vivaldi: How Stereotypes Affect Us and What We Can Do . New York, NY: WW Norton & Company, Inc.

Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (2005).  Understanding by Design (Expanded) . Alexandria, US: Association for Supervision & Curriculum Development (ASCD).

What is a Coursework Assessment?

There are several types of Coursework Assessment (also called CA); however, they all have in common the wide scope of their application and the tools utilized to evaluate a student’s composition coursework. As long as the student can document their coursework, pass the assessment and meet admission requirements, there is no requirement that they disclose their true course status. In other words, an individual can go through his entire academic career without ever knowing that he has been assessed for competency! However, it’s important to recognize that most colleges and universities require students to complete an assessment before accepting them into a program or granting them a degree.

There are many types of course assessment tests available to students. The most common types include multiple-choice, essay, reading, writing, math and personality tests. These assessments are administered either by the college or the university, or by independent companies who specialize in administering assessments. Students can choose to take a variety of these tests or a specific one for their course of study.

What is a coursework assessment? A course profile is the written examination that is written by an instructor for a student to examine throughout a semester or academic year. This type of academic document is considered a formal class assignment, but students are not required to submit it until after they have earned their degree or have satisfactorily passed their course work. In essence, the document serves as a prerequisite for earning a degree or passing out of a course.

Course assessment tests are written and evaluate aspects of a student’s entire course of study. They assess the topics you cover throughout your course. For example, if you are a student who wishes to learn about the American government, your assessment might cover how you learned about Congress, the executive branch, and government policy. It might assess your understanding of constitutional drafting, debates and discussions on various social issues, and even economic policies. An assessment might even look at how well you organized your notes and mastered assignments.

What is a coursework assessment? They are used by colleges and universities to determine which courses a student needs to take. They help students prepare for their first course with an eye to helping them succeed.

Every student is different, which is why the process of evaluating a course is so important. The assessment works by examining each student’s strengths and weaknesses. For example, if a student takes a course and performs well in the majority of the classes, the school may consider this to be a positive sign. If that same student struggles with assignments and tests, however, the school might consider him to be a poor performer and give him a lower grade. After all, the school cannot use the grades earned by a student as a yardstick to compare him to other students.

The types of coursework assessments vary, but they all have one common thing: the purpose of the tests is to help the school determine whether or not a student’s coursework and performance warrants a higher or lower educational level. In essence, what is a coursework assessment is the tool used to help the school to figure out whether or not a certain student is up to the task of taking a certain class. When a student does not pass an assessment, he still has a chance to improve his grade!

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What is Coursework? | Definition, Meaning & keypoints!

What is coursework.

Coursework is a practical work or study done by a student in partial fulfilment of a degree or training. Projects, field work, design studies, long essays etc constitutes a coursework. The nature of work which requires to be carried out depends on the course. It is largely a part of learning exercise and a step to prepare you to handle the required work/ task effectively and efficiently.

• folios of essays
• art and craft items
• speaking tests
• practical work
• assignments and experiments undertaken and assessed during the course

As per Oxford dictionary “Coursework” is defined as

Written or practical work done by a student during a course of study, usually assessed in order to count towards a final mark or grade.

Who assigns coursework and why?

Coursework can be assigned by your teacher or mentor. The reason can be an assessment by the teacher but in most of the cases it’s a requirement as per course structure. A coursework is meant to reflect understanding of what has been taught. How well you understand it and apply it in different situations. Your own thoughts and way of thinking about a topic is reflected in your final work. As mentioned earlier nature of coursework is very diverse. Institutions may make you to write (essays, paper, term paper, thesis etc) or make something (sculpture, are & craft related things) or take some form of test. All these activities done as a coursework award you marks or grades which are counted to evaluate your overall grade for a particular course or purpose. Your creativity, understanding, innovative aspect, talent etc are reflected in the work done by you. Some of the most widely used form of coursework include thesis, dissertations, research paper & term paper as far as writing is concerned. Model making, crafts and other similar activity is generally given when creativity aspect is to be assessed. There may be a combination of these in few cases. The whole purpose largely depends on what your course and what it prepares you to be.

Major types of coursework & how to go about them?

Students have different and mix reaction when coursework is given. Some are excited as it gives them an option to put in effort and bring out something new. They are happy and confident to present their viewpoint and grasp of the topic. While some feels it is a burden and unnecessary task and just want to get away with it. Whatever the case may be there are few guidelines and rules while writing coursework which everyone should follow. Writing a coursework can also be fun!

Some of the steps to help you get started includes:

Coursework for academic topics which require writing:

• Do some research about your topic of interest or assigned topic
• Finalize your topic
• Prepare a structure especially for long writing coursework such as thesis
• Write an abstract or summary for approval from mentor/teacher.
• Do a thorough research for collecting data , facts.
• Start writing and keep on doing the required research
• Check for plagiarism (if any) and work to remove it
• Give credits & references

What makes a good and effective content

A good and effective content is easy to read and understand by readers. Some of the points while writing a content to improve its quality are

• Well- structured
• Well Illustrated
• Predictable

Coursework requiring you to make something like model, sculpture or artwork

• Find something which you appreciate (its design, concept, through, history, significance)
• Come up with what remains the focus area for your coursework
• Decide what you wish to make and in what form eg. model (scaled or not to scale), sculpture or some craftwork
• Finalize the materials to be used such as waste materials, wax, wood, metal, plastic etc
• Collect all the required stuff for making your masterpiece
• Have a mental image prepared and preferably a rough sketch
• Get working!

Key points to be kept in mind while working on coursework

• Originality – Your topic/ idea should be original. Originality of idea is given significant importance and can be a deal breaker. This is not just of the requirement in most of the cases but also a scoring parameter. There are countless number of students and scholars doing research so having an original idea keeps you on positive side. Some students prefer contacting  SmartWritingService coursework writing service to get professional help from experts.
• Need – If you coursework is solution oriented then you must clearly identify the key problems and issues which you aim to cover under your work. A good solution cannot be provided unless the problem has been understood well.
• Uniqueness – Uniqueness in terms of idea and work. Preparing good questionnaires and conducting surveys adds to uniqueness and originality of content. Not only your topic and but also content should be unique. Avoid plagiarism, copying is a strict “NO”. Any form and extent of plagiarism is dealt seriously if caught and can even disqualify your submission.
• Your Input – This is the most crucial aspect. Your inputs will reflect the understanding and applicability of topic by you. This is the whole purpose of having a coursework. Try your best and put best foot forward. Having a well structured and presented work is something a teacher and mentor is looking for.
• Outcomes & way forward – Having worked and making lots of efforts doesn’t have much value unless useful outcomes are shown. Having a good & meaningful analysis and presentation of data with the  best data extraction service is an essential factor. These can be in form of proposals or problem identification. Your work might conclude your topic or pave a path for others to continue working. Depending on the work and nature of coursework give a conclusion to your study and propose what can be done next or how it can be used.

Coursework & Higher Education

Doctorates are the highest degrees conferred by universities. An online or on campus doctorate can lead to a high-level position in a number of different fields, from business administration to health care to quality control. The lengthy road to earning a doctorate can be shortened by at least several months through online study.

The doctorate degree requires two to five years of postgraduate work, the writing of a thesis, and the passing of oral and written examinations. Most doctoral degrees are the doctor of philosophy (Ph.D.) degree, although recipients of this degree may have studied a number of academic fields other than philosophy.

Doctorate degrees are now available in numerous fields, including:

• Business Administration
• Computer Science
• Environmental Engineering
• Health Administration
• Industrial Engineering
• International Business
• Quality Control

Admission to doctoral programs requires completion of an undergraduate degree program and typically, but not always, of a master’s degree program. Students earning a doctorate must take a specified number of advanced graduate-level courses, requiring at least two or three years of study beyond the master’s degree. Upon passing written or oral examinations, or a combination of both, doctoral students are granted the status of doctoral candidates. Then they must research and write a dissertation on an original topic, and then satisfactorily defend the dissertation before a committee of professors in the field.

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Summative Assessment

Summative assessments are used to evaluate student learning, skill acquisition, and academic achievement at the conclusion of a defined instructional period—typically at the end of a project, unit, course, semester, program, or school year. Generally speaking, summative assessments are defined by three major criteria:

• The tests, assignments, or projects are used to determine whether students have learned what they were expected to learn. In other words, what makes an assessment “summative” is not the design of the test, assignment, or self-evaluation, per se, but the way it is used—i.e., to determine whether and to what degree students have learned the material they have been taught.
• Summative assessments are given at the conclusion of a specific instructional period, and therefore they are generally evaluative, rather than diagnostic—i.e., they are more appropriately used to determine learning progress and achievement, evaluate the effectiveness of educational programs, measure progress toward improvement goals, or make course-placement decisions, among other possible applications.
• Summative-assessment results are often recorded as scores or grades that are then factored into a student’s permanent academic record, whether they end up as letter grades on a report card or test scores used in the college-admissions process. While summative assessments are typically a major component of the grading process in most districts, schools, and courses, not all assessments considered to be summative are graded.

Summative assessments are commonly contrasted with formative assessments , which collect detailed information that educators can use to improve instruction and student learning while it’s happening. In other words, formative assessments are often said to be for learning, while summative assessments are of learning. Or as assessment expert Paul Black put it, “When the cook tastes the soup, that’s formative assessment. When the customer tastes the soup, that’s summative assessment.” It should be noted, however, that the distinction between formative and summative is often fuzzy in practice, and educators may have divergent interpretations and opinions on the subject.

Some of the most well-known and widely discussed examples of summative assessments are the standardized tests administered by states and testing organizations, usually in math, reading, writing, and science. Other examples of summative assessments include:

• End-of-unit or chapter tests.
• End-of-term or semester tests.
• Standardized tests that are used to for the purposes of school accountability, college admissions (e.g., the SAT or ACT), or end-of-course evaluation (e.g., Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate exams).
• Culminating demonstrations of learning or other forms of “performance assessment,” such as portfolios of student work that are collected over time and evaluated by teachers or capstone projects that students work on over extended periods of time and that they present and defend at the conclusion of a school year or their high school education.

While most summative assessments are given at the conclusion of an instructional period, some summative assessments can still be used diagnostically. For example, the growing availability of student data, made possible by online grading systems and databases, can give teachers access to assessment results from previous years or other courses. By reviewing this data, teachers may be able to identify students more likely to struggle academically in certain subject areas or with certain concepts. In addition, students may be allowed to take some summative tests multiple times, and teachers might use the results to help prepare students for future administrations of the test.

It should also be noted that districts and schools may use “interim” or “benchmark” tests to monitor the academic progress of students and determine whether they are on track to mastering the material that will be evaluated on end-of-course tests or standardized tests. Some educators consider interim tests to be formative, since they are often used diagnostically to inform instructional modifications, but others may consider them to be summative. There is ongoing debate in the education community about this distinction, and interim assessments may defined differently from place to place. See  formative assessment  for a more detailed discussion.

While educators have arguably been using “summative assessments” in various forms since the invention of schools and teaching, summative assessments have in recent decades become components of larger school-improvement efforts. As they always have, summative assessments can help teachers determine whether students are making adequate academic progress or meeting expected learning standards, and results may be used to inform modifications to instructional techniques, lesson designs, or teaching materials the next time a course, unit, or lesson is taught. Yet perhaps the biggest changes in the use of summative assessments have resulted from state and federal policies aimed at improving public education—specifically, standardized high-stakes tests used to make important decisions about schools, teachers, and students.

While there is little disagreement among educators about the need for or utility of summative assessments, debates and disagreements tend to center on issues of fairness and effectiveness, especially when summative-assessment results are used for high-stakes purposes. In these cases, educators, experts, reformers, policy makers, and others may debate whether assessments are being designed and used appropriately, or whether high-stakes tests are either beneficial or harmful to the educational process. For more detailed discussions of these issues, see high-stakes test , measurement error , test accommodations , test bias , score inflation , standardized test , and value-added measures .

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Assessing student learning.

Forms and Purposes of Student Assessment

Assessment is more than grading, assessment plans, methods of student assessment, generative and reflective assessment, teaching guides related to student assessment, references and additional resources.

Student assessment is, arguably, the centerpiece of the teaching and learning process and therefore the subject of much discussion in the scholarship of teaching and learning. Without some method of obtaining and analyzing evidence of student learning, we can never know whether our teaching is making a difference. That is, teaching requires some process through which we can come to know whether students are developing the desired knowledge and skills, and therefore whether our instruction is effective. Learning assessment is like a magnifying glass we hold up to students’ learning to discern whether the teaching and learning process is functioning well or is in need of change.

To provide an overview of learning assessment, this teaching guide has several goals, 1) to define student learning assessment and why it is important, 2) to discuss several approaches that may help to guide and refine student assessment, 3) to address various methods of student assessment, including the test and the essay, and 4) to offer several resources for further research. In addition, you may find helfpul this five-part video series on assessment that was part of the Center for Teaching’s Online Course Design Institute.

What is student assessment and why is it Important?

In their handbook for course-based review and assessment, Martha L. A. Stassen et al. define assessment as “the systematic collection and analysis of information to improve student learning” (2001, p. 5). An intentional and thorough assessment of student learning is vital because it provides useful feedback to both instructors and students about the extent to which students are successfully meeting learning objectives. In their book Understanding by Design , Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe offer a framework for classroom instruction — “Backward Design”— that emphasizes the critical role of assessment. For Wiggins and McTighe, assessment enables instructors to determine the metrics of measurement for student understanding of and proficiency in course goals. Assessment provides the evidence needed to document and validate that meaningful learning has occurred (2005, p. 18). Their approach “encourages teachers and curriculum planners to first ‘think like an assessor’ before designing specific units and lessons, and thus to consider up front how they will determine if students have attained the desired understandings” (Wiggins and McTighe, 2005, p. 18). [1]

Not only does effective assessment provide us with valuable information to support student growth, but it also enables critically reflective teaching. Stephen Brookfield, in Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher, argues that critical reflection on one’s teaching is an essential part of developing as an educator and enhancing the learning experience of students (1995). Critical reflection on one’s teaching has a multitude of benefits for instructors, including the intentional and meaningful development of one’s teaching philosophy and practices. According to Brookfield, referencing higher education faculty, “A critically reflective teacher is much better placed to communicate to colleagues and students (as well as to herself) the rationale behind her practice. She works from a position of informed commitment” (Brookfield, 1995, p. 17). One important lens through which we may reflect on our teaching is our student evaluations and student learning assessments. This reflection allows educators to determine where their teaching has been effective in meeting learning goals and where it has not, allowing for improvements. Student assessment, then, both develop the rationale for pedagogical choices, and enables teachers to measure the effectiveness of their teaching.

The scholarship of teaching and learning discusses two general forms of assessment. The first, summative assessment , is one that is implemented at the end of the course of study, for example via comprehensive final exams or papers. Its primary purpose is to produce an evaluation that “sums up” student learning. Summative assessment is comprehensive in nature and is fundamentally concerned with learning outcomes. While summative assessment is often useful for communicating final evaluations of student achievement, it does so without providing opportunities for students to reflect on their progress, alter their learning, and demonstrate growth or improvement; nor does it allow instructors to modify their teaching strategies before student learning in a course has concluded (Maki, 2002).

The second form, formative assessment , involves the evaluation of student learning at intermediate points before any summative form. Its fundamental purpose is to help students during the learning process by enabling them to reflect on their challenges and growth so they may improve. By analyzing students’ performance through formative assessment and sharing the results with them, instructors help students to “understand their strengths and weaknesses and to reflect on how they need to improve over the course of their remaining studies” (Maki, 2002, p. 11). Pat Hutchings refers to as “assessment behind outcomes”: “the promise of assessment—mandated or otherwise—is improved student learning, and improvement requires attention not only to final results but also to how results occur. Assessment behind outcomes means looking more carefully at the process and conditions that lead to the learning we care about…” (Hutchings, 1992, p. 6, original emphasis). Formative assessment includes all manner of coursework with feedback, discussions between instructors and students, and end-of-unit examinations that provide an opportunity for students to identify important areas for necessary growth and development for themselves (Brown and Knight, 1994).

It is important to recognize that both summative and formative assessment indicate the purpose of assessment, not the method . Different methods of assessment (discussed below) can either be summative or formative depending on when and how the instructor implements them. Sally Brown and Peter Knight in Assessing Learners in Higher Education caution against a conflation of the method (e.g., an essay) with the goal (formative or summative): “Often the mistake is made of assuming that it is the method which is summative or formative, and not the purpose. This, we suggest, is a serious mistake because it turns the assessor’s attention away from the crucial issue of feedback” (1994, p. 17). If an instructor believes that a particular method is formative, but he or she does not take the requisite time or effort to provide extensive feedback to students, the assessment effectively functions as a summative assessment despite the instructor’s intentions (Brown and Knight, 1994). Indeed, feedback and discussion are critical factors that distinguish between formative and summative assessment; formative assessment is only as good as the feedback that accompanies it.

It is not uncommon to conflate assessment with grading, but this would be a mistake. Student assessment is more than just grading. Assessment links student performance to specific learning objectives in order to provide useful information to students and instructors about learning and teaching, respectively. Grading, on the other hand, according to Stassen et al. (2001) merely involves affixing a number or letter to an assignment, giving students only the most minimal indication of their performance relative to a set of criteria or to their peers: “Because grades don’t tell you about student performance on individual (or specific) learning goals or outcomes, they provide little information on the overall success of your course in helping students to attain the specific and distinct learning objectives of interest” (Stassen et al., 2001, p. 6). Grades are only the broadest of indicators of achievement or status, and as such do not provide very meaningful information about students’ learning of knowledge or skills, how they have developed, and what may yet improve. Unfortunately, despite the limited information grades provide students about their learning, grades do provide students with significant indicators of their status – their academic rank, their credits towards graduation, their post-graduation opportunities, their eligibility for grants and aid, etc. – which can distract students from the primary goal of assessment: learning. Indeed, shifting the focus of assessment away from grades and towards more meaningful understandings of intellectual growth can encourage students (as well as instructors and institutions) to attend to the primary goal of education.

Barbara Walvoord (2010) argues that assessment is more likely to be successful if there is a clear plan, whether one is assessing learning in a course or in an entire curriculum (see also Gelmon, Holland, and Spring, 2018). Without some intentional and careful plan, assessment can fall prey to unclear goals, vague criteria, limited communication of criteria or feedback, invalid or unreliable assessments, unfairness in student evaluations, or insufficient or even unmeasured learning. There are several steps in this planning process.

• Defining learning goals. An assessment plan usually begins with a clearly articulated set of learning goals.
• Defining assessment methods. Once goals are clear, an instructor must decide on what evidence – assignment(s) – will best reveal whether students are meeting the goals. We discuss several common methods below, but these need not be limited by anything but the learning goals and the teaching context.
• Developing the assessment. The next step would be to formulate clear formats, prompts, and performance criteria that ensure students can prepare effectively and provide valid, reliable evidence of their learning.
• Integrating assessment with other course elements. Then the remainder of the course design process can be completed. In both integrated (Fink 2013) and backward course design models (Wiggins & McTighe 2005), the primary assessment methods, once chosen, become the basis for other smaller reading and skill-building assignments as well as daily learning experiences such as lectures, discussions, and other activities that will prepare students for their best effort in the assessments.
• Communicate about the assessment. Once the course has begun, it is possible and necessary to communicate the assignment and its performance criteria to students. This communication may take many and preferably multiple forms to ensure student clarity and preparation, including assignment overviews in the syllabus, handouts with prompts and assessment criteria, rubrics with learning goals, model assignments (e.g., papers), in-class discussions, and collaborative decision-making about prompts or criteria, among others.
• Administer the assessment. Instructors then can implement the assessment at the appropriate time, collecting evidence of student learning – e.g., receiving papers or administering tests.
• Analyze the results. Analysis of the results can take various forms – from reading essays to computer-assisted test scoring – but always involves comparing student work to the performance criteria and the relevant scholarly research from the field(s).
• Communicate the results. Instructors then compose an assessment complete with areas of strength and improvement, and communicate it to students along with grades (if the assignment is graded), hopefully within a reasonable time frame. This also is the time to determine whether the assessment was valid and reliable, and if not, how to communicate this to students and adjust feedback and grades fairly. For instance, were the test or essay questions confusing, yielding invalid and unreliable assessments of student knowledge.
• Reflect and revise. Once the assessment is complete, instructors and students can develop learning plans for the remainder of the course so as to ensure improvements, and the assignment may be changed for future courses, as necessary.

Let’s see how this might work in practice through an example. An instructor in a Political Science course on American Environmental Policy may have a learning goal (among others) of students understanding the historical precursors of various environmental policies and how these both enabled and constrained the resulting legislation and its impacts on environmental conservation and health. The instructor therefore decides that the course will be organized around a series of short papers that will combine to make a thorough policy report, one that will also be the subject of student presentations and discussions in the last third of the course. Each student will write about an American environmental policy of their choice, with a first paper addressing its historical precursors, a second focused on the process of policy formation, and a third analyzing the extent of its impacts on environmental conservation or health. This will help students to meet the content knowledge goals of the course, in addition to its goals of improving students’ research, writing, and oral presentation skills. The instructor then develops the prompts, guidelines, and performance criteria that will be used to assess student skills, in addition to other course elements to best prepare them for this work – e.g., scaffolded units with quizzes, readings, lectures, debates, and other activities. Once the course has begun, the instructor communicates with the students about the learning goals, the assignments, and the criteria used to assess them, giving them the necessary context (goals, assessment plan) in the syllabus, handouts on the policy papers, rubrics with assessment criteria, model papers (if possible), and discussions with them as they need to prepare. The instructor then collects the papers at the appropriate due dates, assesses their conceptual and writing quality against the criteria and field’s scholarship, and then provides written feedback and grades in a manner that is reasonably prompt and sufficiently thorough for students to make improvements. Then the instructor can make determinations about whether the assessment method was effective and what changes might be necessary.

Assessment can vary widely from informal checks on understanding, to quizzes, to blogs, to essays, and to elaborate performance tasks such as written or audiovisual projects (Wiggins & McTighe, 2005). Below are a few common methods of assessment identified by Brown and Knight (1994) that are important to consider.

According to Euan S. Henderson, essays make two important contributions to learning and assessment: the development of skills and the cultivation of a learning style (1980). The American Association of Colleges & Universities (AAC&U) also has found that intensive writing is a “high impact” teaching practice likely to help students in their engagement, learning, and academic attainment (Kuh 2008).

Things to Keep in Mind about Essays

• Essays are a common form of writing assignment in courses and can be either a summative or formative form of assessment depending on how the instructor utilizes them.
• Essays encompass a wide array of narrative forms and lengths, from short descriptive essays to long analytical or creative ones. Shorter essays are often best suited to assess student’s understanding of threshold concepts and discrete analytical or writing skills, while longer essays afford assessments of higher order concepts and more complex learning goals, such as rigorous analysis, synthetic writing, problem solving, or creative tasks.
• A common challenge of the essay is that students can use them simply to regurgitate rather than analyze and synthesize information to make arguments. Students need performance criteria and prompts that urge them to go beyond mere memorization and comprehension, but encourage the highest levels of learning on Bloom’s Taxonomy . This may open the possibility for essay assignments that go beyond the common summary or descriptive essay on a given topic, but demand, for example, narrative or persuasive essays or more creative projects.
• Instructors commonly assume that students know how to write essays and can encounter disappointment or frustration when they discover that this is sometimes not the case. For this reason, it is important for instructors to make their expectations clear and be prepared to assist, or provide students to resources that will enhance their writing skills. Faculty may also encourage students to attend writing workshops at university writing centers, such as Vanderbilt University’s Writing Studio .

Exams and time-constrained, individual assessment

Examinations have traditionally been a gold standard of assessment, particularly in post-secondary education. Many educators prefer them because they can be highly effective, they can be standardized, they are easily integrated into disciplines with certification standards, and they are efficient to implement since they can allow for less labor-intensive feedback and grading. They can involve multiple forms of questions, be of varying lengths, and can be used to assess multiple levels of student learning. Like essays they can be summative or formative forms of assessment.

Things to Keep in Mind about Exams

• Exams typically focus on the assessment of students’ knowledge of facts, figures, and other discrete information crucial to a course. While they can involve questioning that demands students to engage in higher order demonstrations of comprehension, problem solving, analysis, synthesis, critique, and even creativity, such exams often require more time to prepare and validate.
• Exam questions can be multiple choice, true/false, or other discrete answer formats, or they can be essay or problem-solving. For more on how to write good multiple choice questions, see this guide .
• Exams can make significant demands on students’ factual knowledge and therefore can have the side-effect of encouraging cramming and surface learning. Further, when exams are offered infrequently, or when they have high stakes by virtue of their heavy weighting in course grade schemes or in student goals, they may accompany violations of academic integrity.
• In the process of designing an exam, instructors should consider the following questions. What are the learning objectives that the exam seeks to evaluate? Have students been adequately prepared to meet exam expectations? What are the skills and abilities that students need to do well on the exam? How will this exam be utilized to enhance the student learning process?

Self-Assessment

The goal of implementing self-assessment in a course is to enable students to develop their own judgment and the capacities for critical meta-cognition – to learn how to learn. In self-assessment students are expected to assess both the processes and products of their learning. While the assessment of the product is often the task of the instructor, implementing student self-assessment in the classroom ensures students evaluate their performance and the process of learning that led to it. Self-assessment thus provides a sense of student ownership of their learning and can lead to greater investment and engagement. It also enables students to develop transferable skills in other areas of learning that involve group projects and teamwork, critical thinking and problem-solving, as well as leadership roles in the teaching and learning process with their peers.

Things to Keep in Mind about Self-Assessment

• Self-assessment is not self-grading. According to Brown and Knight, “Self-assessment involves the use of evaluative processes in which judgement is involved, where self-grading is the marking of one’s own work against a set of criteria and potential outcomes provided by a third person, usually the [instructor]” (1994, p. 52). Self-assessment can involve self-grading, but instructors of record retain the final authority to determine and assign grades.
• To accurately and thoroughly self-assess, students require clear learning goals for the assignment in question, as well as rubrics that clarify different performance criteria and levels of achievement for each. These rubrics may be instructor-designed, or they may be fashioned through a collaborative dialogue with students. Rubrics need not include any grade assignation, but merely descriptive academic standards for different criteria.
• Students may not have the expertise to assess themselves thoroughly, so it is helpful to build students’ capacities for self-evaluation, and it is important that they always be supplemented with faculty assessments.
• Students may initially resist instructor attempts to involve themselves in the assessment process. This is usually due to insecurities or lack of confidence in their ability to objectively evaluate their own work, or possibly because of habituation to more passive roles in the learning process. Brown and Knight note, however, that when students are asked to evaluate their work, frequently student-determined outcomes are very similar to those of instructors, particularly when the criteria and expectations have been made explicit in advance (1994).
• Methods of self-assessment vary widely and can be as unique as the instructor or the course. Common forms of self-assessment involve written or oral reflection on a student’s own work, including portfolio, logs, instructor-student interviews, learner diaries and dialog journals, post-test reflections, and the like.

Peer Assessment

Peer assessment is a type of collaborative learning technique where students evaluate the work of their peers and, in return, have their own work evaluated as well. This dimension of assessment is significantly grounded in theoretical approaches to active learning and adult learning . Like self-assessment, peer assessment gives learners ownership of learning and focuses on the process of learning as students are able to “share with one another the experiences that they have undertaken” (Brown and Knight, 1994, p. 52).  However, it also provides students with other models of performance (e.g., different styles or narrative forms of writing), as well as the opportunity to teach, which can enable greater preparation, reflection, and meta-cognitive organization.

Things to Keep in Mind about Peer Assessment

• Similar to self-assessment, students benefit from clear and specific learning goals and rubrics. Again, these may be instructor-defined or determined through collaborative dialogue.
• Also similar to self-assessment, it is important to not conflate peer assessment and peer grading, since grading authority is retained by the instructor of record.
• While student peer assessments are most often fair and accurate, they sometimes can be subject to bias. In competitive educational contexts, for example when students are graded normatively (“on a curve”), students can be biased or potentially game their peer assessments, giving their fellow students unmerited low evaluations. Conversely, in more cooperative teaching environments or in cases when they are friends with their peers, students may provide overly favorable evaluations. Also, other biases associated with identity (e.g., race, gender, or class) and personality differences can shape student assessments in unfair ways. Therefore, it is important for instructors to encourage fairness, to establish processes based on clear evidence and identifiable criteria, and to provide instructor assessments as accompaniments or correctives to peer evaluations.
• Students may not have the disciplinary expertise or assessment experience of the instructor, and therefore can issue unsophisticated judgments of their peers. Therefore, to avoid unfairness, inaccuracy, and limited comments, formative peer assessments may need to be supplemented with instructor feedback.

As Brown and Knight assert, utilizing multiple methods of assessment, including more than one assessor when possible, improves the reliability of the assessment data. It also ensures that students with diverse aptitudes and abilities can be assessed accurately and have equal opportunities to excel. However, a primary challenge to the multiple methods approach is how to weigh the scores produced by multiple methods of assessment. When particular methods produce higher range of marks than others, instructors can potentially misinterpret and mis-evaluate student learning. Ultimately, they caution that, when multiple methods produce different messages about the same student, instructors should be mindful that the methods are likely assessing different forms of achievement (Brown and Knight, 1994).

These are only a few of the many forms of assessment that one might use to evaluate and enhance student learning (see also ideas present in Brown and Knight, 1994). To this list of assessment forms and methods we may add many more that encourage students to produce anything from research papers to films, theatrical productions to travel logs, op-eds to photo essays, manifestos to short stories. The limits of what may be assigned as a form of assessment is as varied as the subjects and skills we seek to empower in our students. Vanderbilt’s Center for Teaching has an ever-expanding array of guides on creative models of assessment that are present below, so please visit them to learn more about other assessment innovations and subjects.

Whatever plan and method you use, assessment often begins with an intentional clarification of the values that drive it. While many in higher education may argue that values do not have a role in assessment, we contend that values (for example, rigor) always motivate and shape even the most objective of learning assessments. Therefore, as in other aspects of assessment planning, it is helpful to be intentional and critically reflective about what values animate your teaching and the learning assessments it requires. There are many values that may direct learning assessment, but common ones include rigor, generativity, practicability, co-creativity, and full participation (Bandy et al., 2018). What do these characteristics mean in practice?

Rigor. In the context of learning assessment, rigor means aligning our methods with the goals we have for students, principles of validity and reliability, ethics of fairness and doing no harm, critical examinations of the meaning we make from the results, and good faith efforts to improve teaching and learning. In short, rigor suggests understanding learning assessment as we would any other form of intentional, thoroughgoing, critical, and ethical inquiry.

Generativity. Learning assessments may be most effective when they create conditions for the emergence of new knowledge and practice, including student learning and skill development, as well as instructor pedagogy and teaching methods. Generativity opens up rather than closes down possibilities for discovery, reflection, growth, and transformation.

Practicability. Practicability recommends that learning assessment be grounded in the realities of the world as it is, fitting within the boundaries of both instructor’s and students’ time and labor. While this may, at times, advise a method of learning assessment that seems to conflict with the other values, we believe that assessment fails to be rigorous, generative, participatory, or co-creative if it is not feasible and manageable for instructors and students.

Full Participation. Assessments should be equally accessible to, and encouraging of, learning for all students, empowering all to thrive regardless of identity or background. This requires multiple and varied methods of assessment that are inclusive of diverse identities – racial, ethnic, national, linguistic, gendered, sexual, class, etcetera – and their varied perspectives, skills, and cultures of learning.

Co-creation. As alluded to above regarding self- and peer-assessment, co-creative approaches empower students to become subjects of, not just objects of, learning assessment. That is, learning assessments may be more effective and generative when assessment is done with, not just for or to, students. This is consistent with feminist, social, and community engagement pedagogies, in which values of co-creation encourage us to critically interrogate and break down hierarchies between knowledge producers (traditionally, instructors) and consumers (traditionally, students) (e.g., Saltmarsh, Hartley, & Clayton, 2009, p. 10; Weimer, 2013). In co-creative approaches, students’ involvement enhances the meaningfulness, engagement, motivation, and meta-cognitive reflection of assessments, yielding greater learning (Bass & Elmendorf, 2019). The principle of students being co-creators of their own education is what motivates the course design and professional development work Vanderbilt University’s Center for Teaching has organized around the Students as Producers theme.

Below is a list of other CFT teaching guides that supplement this one and may be of assistance as you consider all of the factors that shape your assessment plan.

• Active Learning
• An Introduction to Lecturing
• Beyond the Essay: Making Student Thinking Visible in the Humanities
• Bloom’s Taxonomy
• Classroom Assessment Techniques (CATs)
• Classroom Response Systems
• How People Learn
• Service-Learning and Community Engagement
• Syllabus Construction
• Teaching with Blogs
• Test-Enhanced Learning
• Assessing Student Learning (a five-part video series for the CFT’s Online Course Design Institute)

Angelo, Thomas A., and K. Patricia Cross. Classroom Assessment Techniques: A Handbook for College Teachers . 2 nd edition. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1993. Print.

Bandy, Joe, Mary Price, Patti Clayton, Julia Metzker, Georgia Nigro, Sarah Stanlick, Stephani Etheridge Woodson, Anna Bartel, & Sylvia Gale. Democratically engaged assessment: Reimagining the purposes and practices of assessment in community engagement . Davis, CA: Imagining America, 2018. Web.

Bass, Randy and Heidi Elmendorf. 2019. “ Designing for Difficulty: Social Pedagogies as a Framework for Course Design .” Social Pedagogies: Teagle Foundation White Paper. Georgetown University, 2019. Web.

Brookfield, Stephen D. Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher . San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1995. Print

Brown, Sally, and Peter Knight. Assessing Learners in Higher Education . 1 edition. London ;Philadelphia: Routledge, 1998. Print.

Cameron, Jeanne et al. “Assessment as Critical Praxis: A Community College Experience.” Teaching Sociology 30.4 (2002): 414–429. JSTOR . Web.

Fink, L. Dee. Creating Significant Learning Experiences: An Integrated Approach to Designing College Courses. Second Edition. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2013. Print.

Gibbs, Graham and Claire Simpson. “Conditions under which Assessment Supports Student Learning. Learning and Teaching in Higher Education 1 (2004): 3-31. Print.

Henderson, Euan S. “The Essay in Continuous Assessment.” Studies in Higher Education 5.2 (1980): 197–203. Taylor and Francis+NEJM . Web.

Gelmon, Sherril B., Barbara Holland, and Amy Spring. Assessing Service-Learning and Civic Engagement: Principles and Techniques. Second Edition . Stylus, 2018. Print.

Kuh, George. High-Impact Educational Practices: What They Are, Who Has Access to Them, and Why They Matter , American Association of Colleges & Universities, 2008. Web.

Maki, Peggy L. “Developing an Assessment Plan to Learn about Student Learning.” The Journal of Academic Librarianship 28.1 (2002): 8–13. ScienceDirect . Web. The Journal of Academic Librarianship. Print.

Sharkey, Stephen, and William S. Johnson. Assessing Undergraduate Learning in Sociology . ASA Teaching Resource Center, 1992. Print.

Walvoord, Barbara. Assessment Clear and Simple: A Practical Guide for Institutions, Departments, and General Education. Second Edition . San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2010. Print.

Weimer, Maryellen. Learner-Centered Teaching: Five Key Changes to Practice. Second Edition . San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2013. Print.

Wiggins, Grant, and Jay McTighe. Understanding By Design . 2nd Expanded edition. Alexandria,

VA: Assn. for Supervision & Curriculum Development, 2005. Print.

[1] For more on Wiggins and McTighe’s “Backward Design” model, see our teaching guide here .

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Course Evaluations and End-term Student Feedback

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At Stanford, student course feedback can provide insight into what is working well and suggest ways to develop your teaching strategies and promote student learning, particularly in relation to the specific learning goals you are working to achieve.

There are many ways to assess the effectiveness of teaching and courses , including feedback from students, input from colleagues, and self-reflection. No single method of evaluation offers a complete view. This page describes the end-term student feedback survey and offers recommendations for managing it. 

End-term student feedback

The end-term student feedback survey, often referred to as the “course evaluations”, opens in the last week of instruction each quarter for two weeks:

• Course evaluations are anonymous and run online
• Results are delivered to instructors after final grades are posted
• The minimum course enrollment for evaluations is three students

Two feedback forms

Students provide feedback on their courses using up to two forms:

• The course feedback form gathers feedback on students' experience of the course, covering general questions about learning and course organization, and potentially specific learning goals, course elements, and other instructor-designed questions. At Stanford, this form focuses on the course as a whole and not the performance of individual instructors. Students complete one form for each course, even in a team-teaching situation where there could be several instructors.
• The section feedback form gathers feedback on the TAs or CAs students interact with, usually through sections such as discussions and labs. Even if TAs and CAs do not lead individual sections—for example, they take office hours or assist during labs—they can still receive feedback using this form.

Course evaluation system

The current course evaluation platform is EvaluationKIT, accessible to instructors at evaluationkit.stanford.edu .

End-term course evaluations and EvaluationKIT are managed by Evaluations and Research, part of Learning Technologies and Spaces (LTS) within Student Affairs . You can find comprehensive information about end-term course evaluations on the Evaluations and Research website.

Tailored custom questions

The course and section forms are customizable , allowing you to add specific questions, such as learning goals, course elements (such as textbooks), and even questions of your own, so that you can gather targeted feedback on aspects of your course design.

Although you are not required to customize your questions, it is an excellent way to gather information on any aspect of the course that you want to assess, such as a new teaching technique, an activity, or an approach you want to revise. If you do not customize, your students will still respond to the standard questions.

Managing your end-term feedback

Whether you are new to Stanford or familiar with the course evaluations system, these are the most useful links to managing your evaluations every quarter:

• Key dates : review the key dates for customization, opening and closing of the evaluations, and reports.
• Customization is open for four weeks each quarter, starting in Week 4, so you can add your own questions to the course and section forms.
• Interpreting your reports : Reading and interpreting feedback effectively will help you to assess what is working and identify areas where your course may need to make adjustments.
• The Evaluations and Research website has many resources to help you find, read, and interpret evaluation reports, as well as understand the scope and limitations of teaching evaluations.

Need help understanding or responding to course evaluations?

The Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) has trained and experienced teaching consultants who can help you interpret results and advise on teaching strategies. Contact CTL to request a consultation at any time.

Further sources of evaluation and feedback

There are many other sources of feedback that can help inform your teaching and learning decisions, including:

• Mid-term student feedback is an excellent way to gather actionable insights into a course while the course is still in progress and it is possible to make adjustments, if necessary, before the end of the quarter.   Consider a Small Group Feedback Session offered by CTL or an in-class survey .
• Input from colleagues , such as peer observations, particularly when including a review of materials and course goals, and using a consistent review protocol. Peer review can include online materials, modules, and courses using criteria similar to those for in-class instruction.
• Instructor’s self-reflection , including evaluation of course materials, such as syllabi, assignments, exams, papers, and so on. 
• Other contributions, such as those to curriculum development, supervision of student research, mentoring of other instructors, creation of instructional materials, and published research on teaching, can be assessed by colleagues and also form part of a general teaching portfolio.

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Center for the Enhancement of Teaching & Learning

Course Assessment Toolkit

This toolkit provides resources to help instructors create measurable learning outcomes and develop classroom assessments to track student learning.

• Teaching Toolkits
• Course Assessment Toolbox

Course-level assessment is a process of systematically examining and refining the fit between the course activities and what students should know at the end of the course. It involves both formative and summative assessment of student learning. The most effective course assessment is done throughout the semester, provides opportunities for low-stakes, formative assessment, and is based in authentic demonstrations of a students' learning. The key to effective course assessment is establishing course learning outcomes and developing course assessments that will provide evidence of achievement  (Angelo & Cross, 1993).

This toolkit provides help with developing course learning outcomes and thinking through the type of assessment you want to conduct and how to develop effective assessments.

How do I develop course learning outcomes?

Developing course learning outcomes comes down to thinking through the big ideas you want students to learn from your course. It's important to think about the essential knowledge, skills, and dispositions you want students to leave class with and be able to use later. It is also important to think about what knowledge and skills students need in the next course in your program to ensure their continued success in the major.

For a detailed process to develop course learning outcomes download the Developing Course-Level Student Learning Outcomes Workbook.

What kind of assessment should you conduct in class?

There are two types of assessment - formative and summative. Formative assessment is done early and often in a course to track student learning over time. Formative assessments are low-stakes assessments that won't harm a student's grade but will keep them engaged in course content. They help students identify strengths and areas for improvement in their own learning while also providing faculty with information about how students are grasping content, allowing instructors to adjust a course as needed. 

• Read more about formative and summative assessment
• Watch the CETL webinar on implementing low-stakes assessment in large courses

How can I determine if students can apply course concepts?

Authentic assessments can tell you a lot about students' ability to apply course concepts and think critically about the content. Authentic assessment focuses on application of course knowledge to a new situation using complex, real-world situations that require a student to think about application of knowledge and skills in society rather than just in the classroom. This moves instructors away from multiple choice and memorization, will improve learning, and limit academic dishonesty. 

• Read more about Authentic Assessment

How do I develop a course assessment?

To develop an assessment you want to think about how a student will demonstrate their understanding of a course concept or demonstrate their skill. Developing an effective Classroom Assessment Technique (CAT) takes some thought because you want to be sure that the CAT is assessing what you want it to assess.

For a detailed process to develop classroom assessments download the Developing Classroom Assessment Techniques Workbook and the CAT KIT .

The workbook provides a step-by-step process for developing classroom assessments. The CAT KIT details six assessments and discusses how to develop them for your own needs and how to use the data. Examples of assessments are provided.

How do I align my assessments to my learning outcomes?

Dr. Aaron Haberman explores different summative assessment methods and will help you develop or refine a high stakes summative assessment that directly aligns with one or more of your course-level student learning outcomes.

• Creating Summative Assessments that Align to Student Learning Outcomes

Angelo, T. A., & Cross, K. P. (1993). Classroom assessment techniques: A handbook for college teachers (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, p. 7-11

Support for Course Assessment 

If you need support developing course learning outcomes or assessment you can set up a personal consultation with CETL.

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Coursework - what to expect

Your aspect of your assessment is an important part of the qualifications you take in Years 11 to 14. Knowing what to expect and how best to approach it can help you get higher grades.

Why coursework / internal assessment matters

Many of the subjects you’ll study in Years 11 to 14 are assessed on a mixture of internal assessment and exams. The internally assessed element of a subject can make up a significant part of your final mark and for some subjects, this counts for more than half of the total.

It can be a useful way of showing what you can do, where an exam wouldn’t be suitable, for example, a music presentation or a science experiment, but it can also allow you to:

• study a subject in more depth
• take more responsibility for what you study
• have more control over the pace at which you study

Internally assessed assignments can be set over several days or weeks, so there’s also less chance of your grade being affected if you have an ‘off day’.  

What to expect

The coursework / internal assessment you’re given can take various forms. It could include:

• projects and fieldwork
• written work or extended essays
• experiments and investigations
• performances

Coursework / internal assessment is assessed internally by your teachers or tutors and may be set at any time during your course. You may do some of your coursework outside school hours and some at school under the supervision of your teachers.

For GCSEs , the mix of exams and internal assessment varies depending on the subject. Some, like art and design, have more coursework and fewer exams.

AS and A levels

Many AS and A levels are  made up of a combination of exams and internal assessment, but this varies depending on the subject.

You may also have to do coursework if you take vocational qualifications, or the International Baccalaureate Diploma. The amount of coursework will also depend on which awarding body (exam board) offers the qualification.

• Guide to qualifications

Top tips for success

If you want to get good grades, it’s important to do your best.

Choose your subjects carefully

You’re much more likely to do well if you:

• choose topics you find interesting - this will keep you motivated
• get organised - try to plan your projects carefully and give yourself plenty of time to do all your work
• make sure you find somewhere quiet to study
• research your topics carefully - make sure you do all your research before you start writing up
• write up your coursework clearly and neatly - always check your spelling, grammar and punctuation and check if there is a word limit you need to stick to

Things to avoid

Also, there are some definite no-nos if you want to give yourself the best chance of doing well, so don't:

• leave projects until the last minute
• start writing up before you’ve done all your research
• go over the word limit
• try to watch TV at the same time
• rush things
• copy or plagiarise other people's work

Plagiarism – what it is and how to avoid it

It’s really important that the work you produce is your own. Copying chunks of text and pretending they’re yours is cheating and is known as plagiarism. You can be guilty of plagiarism if you copy from sources such as:

• the internet
• computer programs
• friends or family members

If you copy someone else’s work, you probably won’t understand it properly. You could also really come unstuck if your coursework is linked to exams you have to take later on in the course.

Despite what you might think, plagiarism is often easy to spot as people’s writing styles can stand out. There are also a number of computer programs that can help teachers, tutors and exam boards find out if you have plagiarised someone else's work.

What happens if you're caught

As well as being dishonest and unfair on the person you’re copying from, plagiarism can get you into trouble. You might receive a warning, have your final grade lowered, or even have your qualification taken away.

Sticking to the rules

When you are given an internally assessed assignment, you may want to share ideas or do some research with a classmate. This is okay, but you must make sure that you each write up your work on your own. If you do quote text from other sources, you must always say where it comes from and who wrote it.

Help and advice on coursework / internal assessment

If you’re getting stuck with internal assessment, quite often the best thing to do is speak to your teachers. You can also find lots of help online. Websites like the BBC’s  Bitesize are full of tips and good ideas for coursework, homework and revision.

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Coursework vs Exams: What’s Easier? (Pros and Cons)

In A-Level , GCSE , General by Think Student Editor September 12, 2023 Leave a Comment

Coursework and exams are two different techniques used to assess students on certain subjects. Both of these methods can seem like a drag when trying to get a good grade, as they both take so many hours of work! However, is it true that one of these assessment techniques is easier than the other? Some students pick subjects specifically because they are only assessed via coursework or only assessed via exams, depending on what they find easiest. However, could there be a definite answer to what is the easiest?

If you want to discover whether coursework or exams are easier and the pros and cons of these methods, check out the rest of this article!

Disclaimer: This article is solely based on one student’s opinion. Every student has different perspectives on whether coursework or exams are easier. Therefore, the views expressed in this article may not align with your own.

Table of Contents

Coursework vs exams: what’s easier?

The truth is that whether you find coursework or exams easier depends on you and how you like to work. Different students learn best in different ways and as a result, will have differing views on these two assessment methods.

Coursework requires students to complete assignments and essays throughout the year which are carefully graded and moderated. This work makes up a student’s coursework and contributes to their final grade.

In comparison, exams often only take place at the end of the year. Therefore, students are only assessed at one point in the year instead of throughout. All of a student’s work then leads up to them answering a number of exams which make up their grade.

There are pros and cons for both of these methods, depending on how you learn and are assessed best. Therefore, whether you find coursework or exams easier or not depends on each individual.

Is coursework easier than exams?

Some students believe that coursework is easier than exams. This is because it requires students to work on it all throughout the year, whilst having plenty of resources available to them.

As a result, there is less pressure on students at the end of the year, as they have gradually been able to work hard on their coursework, which then determines their grade. If you do coursework at GCSE or A-Level, you will generally have to complete an extended essay or project.

Some students find this easier than exams because they have lots of time to research and edit their essays, allowing the highest quality of work to be produced. You can discover more about coursework and tips for how to make it stand out if you check out this article from Oxford Royale.

However, some students actually find coursework harder because of the amount of time it takes and all of the research involved. Consequently, whether you prefer coursework or not depends on how you enjoy learning.

What are the cons of coursework?

As already hinted at, the main con of coursework is the amount of time it takes. In my experience, coursework was always such a drag because it took up so much of my time!

When you hear that you have to do a long essay, roughly 2000-3000 words, it sounds easily achievable. However, the amount of research you have to do is immense, and then editing and reviewing your work takes even more time.

Coursework should not be over and done within a week. It requires constant revisits and rephrasing, as you make it as professional sounding and high quality as possible. Teachers are also unable to give lots of help to students doing coursework. This is because it is supposed to be an independent project.

Teachers are able to give some advice, however not too much support. This can be difficult for students who are used to being given lots of help.

You also have to be very careful with what you actually write. If you plagiarise anything that you have written, your coursework could be disqualified. Therefore, it is very important that you pay attention to everything you write and make sure that you don’t copy explicitly from other websites. This can make coursework a risky assessment method.

You are allowed to use websites for research, however you must reference them correctly. This can be a difficult skill for some students to learn also!

What are the pros of coursework?

Some of the cons of coursework already discussed can actually be seen as pros by some students! Due to coursework being completed throughout the year, this places less pressure on students, as they don’t have to worry about final exams completely determining their grade.

Some subjects require students to sit exams and complete some coursework. However, if a student already knows that they have completed some high-quality coursework when it comes to exam season, they are less likely to place pressure on themselves. They know that their coursework could save their grade even if they don’t do very well on the exam.

A lot of coursework also requires students to decide what they want to research or investigate. This allows students to be more creative, as they decide what to research, depending on the subject. This can make school more enjoyable and also give them more ideas about what they want to do in the future.

If you are about to sit your GCSEs and are thinking that coursework is the way to go, check out this article from Think Student to discover which GCSE subjects require students to complete coursework.

What are the cons of exams?

Personally, I hated exams! Most students share this opinion. After all, so much pressure is put on students to complete a set of exams at the end of the school year. Therefore, the main con of sitting exams is the amount of pressure that students are put under.

Unlike coursework, students are unable to go back and revisit the answers to their exams over many weeks. Instead, after those 2 (ish) hours are up, you have to leave the exam hall and that’s it! Your grade will be determined from your exams.

This can be seen as not the best method, as it doesn’t take student’s performances throughout the rest of the year into account. Consequently, if a student is just having a bad day and messes up one of their exams, nothing can be done about it!

If you are struggling with exam stress at the moment, check out this article from Think Student to discover ways of dealing with it.

Exams also require an immense amount of revision which takes up time and can be difficult for students to complete. If you want to discover some revision tips, check out this article from Think Student.

What are the pros of exams?

Exams can be considered easier however because they are over with quickly. Unlike coursework, all students have to do is stay in an exam hall for a couple of hours and it’s done! If you want to discover how long GCSE exams generally last, check out this article from Think Student.

Alternatively, you can find out how long A-Level exams are in this article from Think Student. There is no need to work on one exam paper for weeks – apart from revising of course!

Revising for exams does take a while, however revising can also be beneficial because it increases a student’s knowledge. Going over information again and again means that the student is more likely to remember it and use it in real life. This differs greatly from coursework.

Finally, the main advantage of exams is that it is much harder to cheat in any way. Firstly, this includes outright cheating – there have been issues in the past with students getting other people to write their coursework essays.

However, it also includes the help you get. Some students may have an unfair advantage if their teachers offer more help and guidance with coursework than at other schools. In an exam, it is purely the student’s work.

While this doesn’t necessarily make exams easier than coursework, it does make them fairer, and is the reason why very few GCSEs now include coursework.

If you want to discover more pros and cons of exams, check out this article from AplusTopper.

What type of student is coursework and exams suited to?

You have probably already gathered from this article whether exams or coursework are easier. This is because it all depends on you. Hopefully, the pros and cons outlined have helped you to decide whether exams or coursework is the best assessment method for you.

If you work well under pressure and prefer getting assessed all at once instead of gradually throughout the year, then exams will probably be easier for you. This is also true if you are the kind of person that leaves schoolwork till the last minute! Coursework will definitely be seen as difficult for you if you are known for doing this!

However, if, like me, you buckle under pressure and prefer having lots of time to research and write a perfect essay, then you may find coursework easier. Despite this, most GCSE subjects are assessed via exams. Therefore, you won’t be able to escape all exams!

As a result, it can be useful to find strategies that will help you work through them. This article from Think Student details a range of skills and techniques which could be useful to use when you are in an exam situation.

Exams and coursework are both difficult in their own ways – after all, they are used to thoroughly assess you! Depending on how you work best, it is your decision to decide whether one is easier than the other and which assessment method this is.

Academic Manual

• 3. Module Assessment

Section 3: Module Assessment

Published for 2023-24

3.1 Overarching Principles

3.2 forms of assessment, 3.3 assessment methods and tasks, 3.4 digital assessment, 3.5 language of assessment, 3.6 attendance requirements & eligibility for assessment, 3.7 pass mark, 3.8 marking scale , 3.8.1 requirements , 3.8.2 pass/ fail modules and components , 3.8.3 numeric marking scale.

3.8.4 Letter Grade Marking Scale

3.8.5 Conversion of Marks

3.9 component assessment, 3.10  requirements to pass a module, 3.11 no attempt or minimal attempt at assessment, 3.12 deadlines & late submissions.

Modules at Levels 4, 5 and 6:

Modules at Level 7:

3.13 Word Counts

3.14 academic integrity, advice for students.

Further information and advice for students about assessment is available on the  Examinations & Awards webpages .

Recent Changes

A guide to changes to the regulations are available from the  Recent Changes  page.

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• Current Students

Assessment: Coursework and Examinations

 2023-24, assessment aims.

Upon successful completion of your studies, you will be able to demonstrate specific learning outcomes:

Undergraduate Students will be able to:

• Outline and evaluate contemporary concepts and empirical evidence in relation to the main areas of social policy formulation and implementation
• Critically evaluate the suitability, implications and effects of social policies in different social sectors and across different national contexts
• Construct persuasive, theoretically informed oral and written arguments in relation to key debates in contemporary social policy
• Apply a comprehensive understanding of social policy as a multi-disciplinary field of study to the analysis of social problems
• Understand and deploy basic qualitative and quantitative research skills in the study of social policy problems

Taught postgraduate students will be able to:

• Explain and evaluate the main theoretical positions in the field of social policy formulation and implementation
• Integrate theory from different disciplinary backgrounds into the analysis of social problems
• Construct persuasive oral and written arguments in relation to key issues of social policy theory and practice
• Conduct and design rigorous research projects using a range of methodologies and epistemologies
• Apply theoretically informed approaches to the analysis of social problems

Each degree programme also has specific learning outcomes linked to Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) standards.

Each programme has a conceptual “spine” of core courses which, in combination with option courses, ensure the full range of learning outcomes are achieved.

Forms of Assessment

The Department provides a combination of different assessment methods within each programme. This approach ensures you develop relevant knowledge and skills, and allows the Department to test your learning effectively.

Formative  assessment develops the knowledge and skills that you acquire at LSE.  Formative  assessment is a compulsory part of every programme and may include: class/seminar discussions and presentations; essays; problem sets; dissertation proposals, mock examinations or quizzes.  Formative  assessment does not count towards your overall degree classification but is designed to prepare you for the summative (assessed) work that you will complete later in the course. The feedback you receive from your formative work will help prepare you for your summative work.

Summative  assessment tests whether you have acquired the learning outcomes described above. This is achieved through a variety of methods including closed book and take-home assessments, presentations, coursework and dissertations.  Summative assessment counts towards your overall degree classification. Individual courses may be assessed by one piece of Summative work or by a combination of different types of summative work.

Whatever the form of assessment on your Social Policy courses, you will find our short but comprehensive guidance documents  here , which will answer questions you may have. 

If your course involves an element of coursework, all information (including details of assessment weightings, submission dates etc.) can be found via the course's Moodle page.

Presentation and Content

You will submit summative coursework via Moodle in electronic format only; no hard copies of your work are accepted. 

In the Department of Social Policy, we operate strict word limits for assessments.  Written work must not exceed the word limit  set out in the assessment details. If it is clear that a piece of coursework exceeds the set word limit, markers will only mark strictly up to the word limit for each of your answers.

If you are taking a course from an outside Department, you should make sure to check their policy regarding word limits as different Departments may have different guidance.

Submission                                                                                                                   

The Department of Social Policy has standard procedures for the submission of summative coursework for its courses (any course with the prefix SP). When submitting your work (essay, long essay, dissertation, project etc.):

• Ensure that your assessed work is submitted anonymously. Your name  must not appear anywhere  on the work or coversheet. Your five-digit candidate number (available via LSE for You in AT) should be the only means of identifying your work. Your candidate number should be on the coversheet. Please do not share details of your candidate number with anybody.  The Department will not accept assessed work from you if you have not included your candidate number.
• All the information you need regarding submitting your assessment is available via the relevant course's Moodle page.         

Penalties for the late submission of Summative Assessment                                     

Every piece of assessed work has a clear deadline. The submission deadlines are to be taken seriously, since penalties may be applied in the case of late submissions.

If you have a summative assessment and circumstances outside of your control may prevent you from meeting the deadline (e.g. you become ill) make sure you talk to the Department as there are some options you can explore, depending on the circumstances. These include applying for an extension or a deferral.

If you don’t successfully apply for either of these, and you submit your work late,  penalties will be applied   as follows:

Summative Essays

• Five marks will be deducted for an essay submitted within 24 hours after the deadline
• A further five marks will be deducted for each subsequent 24 hour period (not limited to working days) until the essay is submitted.
• Essays more than five days late will only be accepted with the permission of the Chair of the Sub-Board of Examiners. These penalties apply immediately after the deadline time for submission on the submission date.

Online Assessments (within a 24 hour window): A penalty of 1 mark will be deducted for each minute beyond the deadline up to 15 marks beyond the deadline. Any work received after this will receive a zero mark.

Online Assessments (within either a 48-hour, 72-hour, one-week, two-week or three-week window):

• For the first 24 hours after assessment submission deadline: Five percentage marks will be deducted for every half-day (12 hours), or part of a half day the assessment is received late. This will result in a maximum penalty of ten percentage marks for the first 24 hours.
• For the period beyond the first 24 hours after assessment submission deadline: Ten percentage marks will be deducted for the first 24 hours as above then five percentage marks will be deducted per 24 hour period (not limited to working days) the assessment is late, or 24 hour period, thereafter

In-person Exams and online assessments

In Person Exams take place during the Spring Term (May/June) and are timetabled by the School. There is also a January exam period which takes place just before the start of WT. The Course Guide for the relevant course will state when the in-person exam is expected to take place. i.e (January/Summer)

Social Policy courses do not have in-person exams, but if you are taking a course outside the Department, you should check if the course(s) you are taking  require(s) you to sit an in-person exam.

Please note that Online Assessments are similar in format to traditional exams, but they are (with the exception of 24 hour take-home assessments) timetabled by the Department rather than the School and you will be informed of their deadlines separately from the School’s in-person exam timetable.

The School's exam timetables are published ahead of the exam periods, either in late Autumn or early Winter Term.

You can obtain your unique candidate number ahead of any assessments, and your personal examination timetable via LSE for You ahead of any in-person exams.

To help you prepare effectively for your exams and online assessments you should make yourself fully aware of the format and syllabus to be covered in the exam/assessment.

Past papers can be accessed via the  Library web pages  (access restricted to LSE network only).

Specimen exam papers (or appropriate exam-type questions) are provided for (i) any new course or (ii) an existing course where there have been significant changes to the syllabus in the current academic year. Permitted materials are also specified early in the year.

All assessed work (coursework and exam scripts) must be anonymous and identified only by candidate number. 

Plagiarism- What is it and how to avoid it?

Plagiarism is the attempt to use the work of others as though it is your own work. This applies whether the work is published or not, and can include the work of other students.

Self-Plagiarism is the re-use of your own work without appropriate referencing. The Department is clear that students cannot submit previously assessed, or elements of, their own work (whether work from their time at LSE or another institution) for assessment- this constitutes self-plagiarism. 

The Department ensures that the School’s rules on Plagiarism are clearly communicated. Each Programme handbook clearly sets out the Department’s policy on plagiarism, signposts students to the School’s guidance, and provides examples of what constitutes plagiarism and how to avoid it.

The Department is clear that Plagiarism and Self-Plagiarism are unacceptable, and will be treated seriously according to the School’s regulations. There are sessions which cover avoidance of plagiarism as part of Programme Dissertation workshops. For additional guidance on how to avoid Plagiarism, you are encouraged to contact your Academic Mentor and  LSE Life .

Further information about Plagiarism .

Turnitin- plagiarism detection software

The School considers academic integrity to be an issue of the utmost importance. Under the  Conditions of Registration  for your programme of study you consented to all of your summative coursework (essays, projects, dissertations, etc.) being analysed by plagiarism detection software.

The Department of Social Policy submits all summative coursework to Turnitin UK for textual similarity review and the detection of plagiarism. Copies of all papers submitted to this software will be retained as source documents in the reference database solely for the purpose of detecting plagiarism.

You have the option to submit your coursework to Turnitin yourselves for checking, prior to the final submission of your work. We strongly encourage this practice to make sure that you have not inadvertently plagiarised other work, for which you could still be held responsible.  Here are some Turnitin FAQ's . 

If you wish to submit your coursework to Turnitin yourself, prior to submitting your final piece of work, make sure that you submit it ‘in draft’ on Moodle and NOT ‘for grading’. As long as you submit in draft, you will be able to finalise your coursework before final submission. ONLY when you are sure that you want to finally submit your work for grading should you choose this option. Once your work is submitted for grading, you will not be able to change it.

When you submit the electronic copy in Moodle you will be asked to confirm, at the point of submission, that you understand the School's regulations on plagiarism and assessment, and by submitting your work on Moodle you are confirming that the work you are submitting is your own.

What is feedback?

Feedback is information about your work that you can use to make improvements, and it is an integral part of the teaching and learning process.

Feedback is a two-way process which is most effective when you engage with it fully.

You are informed of the guidelines on assessment and feedback through your  programme handbook  and the  LSE Academic Code .

The Department is committed to providing timely, regular and constructive feedback to you and promotes ‘feedback literacy’ among all its teachers and students to ensure that you understand the full range of feedback methods and opportunities available to you. We encourage you to engage actively with feedback, by learning to recognise when feedback is being given, the different forms it takes, and how best to use it.

The main opportunities you have to receive and discuss feedback are through Classes and Seminars, in Advice and Feedback Hours with your Academic Mentor or another member of Faculty, or via Moodle.

You are expected to understand when feedback is being given and what it means, and to ask for clarification it if is not clear. You may wish to also discuss feedback with fellow students – peer review can provide useful feedback and aid understanding.

When and how is feedback given?

Formative:  Feedback on  formative  work is normally provided within three term-time weeks of submission. It is primarily provided to prepare you for  summative  work. Assignments are returned to you with constructive commentary and guidance for future progress. Feedback is provided in two main forms: in writing (normally using the standard form, including a mark), and orally (students are expected to take notes). Students may also be provided with additional feedback opportunities on their formative work at Academic Mentor meetings.

Summative:  Feedback on  summative  work is normally provided within five term-time weeks of submission, and where possible, prior to future  summative  assessment for summative work submitted in AT and WT. NB.There will be no written feedback for Summative work submitted in the Spring Term (but feedback will be provided for the Dissertation).

Once provisional  overall  marks for a course have been confirmed by the External Examiner, these marks will be released on the School’s  provisional results  page on LSE for You. 

The Department has a general marking framework for both BSc and MSc students which can be found below.

BSc programmes marking framework 

MSc programmes marking framework 

A number of courses have their own versions of the above marking frameworks, adapted to reflect the specific requirements for that course. These can be found on the Moodle page for these courses.

There are three forms of marking which the Department uses. 

For courses which use ‘double-blind’ marking, first and second internal examiners marks each piece of summative work separately, and without any identification of the candidate. The two markers then agree the final internal mark.

Some courses use a method of ‘Sighted double marking’, where all work is examined anonymously by two examiners (as with double-blind marking), but the second marker has sight of the first markers’ marks when reviewing the work.

Some courses use 'single-marking with moderation', where each script is marked by a first marker, and then a selection of scripts are 'moderated' by a second marker to ensure marking standards are consistent. If the moderator finds any inconsistencies, scripts are re-marked.

Careful consideration is given by both the Department and School to ensure that appropriate methods of marking are used on each individual course.

External Examiners receives a representative sample of scripts and other assessed material from every course to review and confirm that internal marking has been consistent and is of an appropriate standard

Marking Schemes for the Award of a Degree:

Classification scheme for the BA/BSc degrees

Scheme for the award of a taught Masters degree (four units)

Taught Masters examination sub-board local rules

What if I need support? Extensions and Exceptional Circumstances

You are encouraged to speak to your Academic Mentor as early as possible if you are experiencing any challenges which are affecting your work. You are also encouraged to speak to your Programmes Support Team who may be able to help.

Requesting an Extension.

Summative work

If you find yourself unable to meet a summative assessment deadline because of illness/injury, bereavement or other serious personal circumstances, and you need to request an extension to the submission deadline, you should do so as early as possible and in advance of the deadline. Useful information outlining the School’s Extension Policy is available  here . 

If you would like to request an extension for SUMMATIVE work on a course based within the Department of Social Policy, the following process will apply. Please send your request to:

BSc level courses:  complete our  BSc extension request form

MSc level courses:  complete our  MSc extension request form

Supporting evidence must be provided with your request, and all evidence must be in English or accompanied by a certified translation. Please refer to our  ‘Standards of Evidence’  table before submitting your supporting evidence. 

In the Department of Social Policy, the Programmes Support team act as the designated contacts for all matters relating to your extension request. Please note that the Department practices anonymous marking, and so the extension process is separated from your course teachers. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact  [email protected]  (for UG enquiries) and  [email protected]  (for MSc enquiries). Please do not contact course convenors directly with any extension or deferral request. If you do have any questions, please contact the relevant Programmes Support team .

Once your extension request and evidence is received, it will be considered by the Chair of the Sub-Board of Examiners . Your Programmes Support team will email you with the outcome of your request, and inform the relevant marker(s). Please note that the final submission of your assessment must still be made via Moodle, regardless of the outcome of your request.

Formative Work

To request an extension on Formative work, please email your Programmes Support team ( [email protected] or [email protected] ) in the first instance, with an outline of what extension you are requesting; the reasons why; and any supporting evidence. 

Exceptional Circumstances

Exceptional circumstances (ECs) concern issues which are unforseen, out of your control and proximate to the timing of an assessment/s you have taken and which you feel may have had a significant impact on your academic performance during an exam, online assessment or other summative assessment. Such circumstances might include, but are not limited to, illness, injury, or bereavement. If you wish to make the Sub-Board of Examiners aware of your circumstances and how these have affected your performance in an assessment/s, please complete the Exceptional Circumstances form ( available here ). The form should be accompanied by supporting evidence of your circumstances (such as doctor's letter, hospital note, death certificate or police report).

Your EC form and supporting documentation must be submitted according to the details available via this webpage .

Under certain circumstances, if you are not in a good position to be able to sit an assessment (i.e., your are not ‘fit-to-sit’, you might be permitted to postpone either one or more assessments to the next appropriate assessment opportunity. This is known as deferral.

You may, for example, experience circumstances which are sudden, unforeseen and outside of your control around the time of one or more assessments. In such a case, you may wish to consider deferring the assessment/s to the next appropriate assessment period.

You can find out more about deferrals here.

Further queries?

If you have any queries please contact  [email protected]  (BSc students) or  [email protected]  (MSc students).

Handbooks for all of our programmes

How to use Feedback effectively A guide for students

Reports External Examiner reports

Formative Assessment of Teaching

What is formative assessment of teaching.

How do you know if your teaching is effective? How can you identify areas where your teaching can improve? What does it look like to assess teaching?

Formative Assessment

Formative assessment of teaching consists of different approaches to continuously evaluate your teaching. The insight gained from this assessment can support revising your teaching strategies, leading to better outcomes in student learning and experiences. Formative assessment can be contrasted with summative assessment, which is usually part of an evaluative decision-making process. The table below outlines some of the key differences between formative and summative assessment: 

By participating in formative assessment, instructors connect with recent developments in the space of teaching and learning, as well as incorporate new ideas into their practice. Developments may include changes in the students we serve, changes in our understanding of effective teaching, and changes in expectations of the discipline and of higher education as a whole.

Formative assessment of teaching ultimately should guide instructors towards using more effective teaching practices. What does effectiveness mean in terms of teaching?

Effectiveness in Teaching

Effective teaching can be defined as teaching that leads to the intended outcomes in student learning and experiences. In this sense, there is no single perfect teaching approach. Effective teaching looks will depend on the stated goals for student learning and experiences. A course that aims to build student confidence in statistical analysis and a course that aims to develop student writing could use very different teaching strategies, and still both be effective at accomplishing their respective goals. 

Assessing student learning and experiences is critical to determining if teaching is truly effective in its context. This assessment can be quite complex, but it is doable. In addition to measuring the impacts of your teaching, you may also consider evaluating your teaching as it aligns with best practices for evidence-based teaching especially in the disciplinary and course context or aligns with your intended teaching approach. The table below outlines these three approaches to assessing the effectiveness of your teaching:

What are some strategies that I might try? 

There are multiple ways that instructors might begin to assess their teaching. The list below includes approaches that may be done solo, with colleagues, or with the input of students. Instructors may pursue one or more of these strategies at different points in time. With each possible strategy, we have included several examples of the strategy in practice from a variety of institutions and contexts.

Teaching Portfolios

Teaching portfolios are well-suited for formative assessment of teaching, as the portfolio format lends itself to documenting how your teaching has evolved over time. Instructors can use their teaching portfolios as a reflective practice to review past teaching experiences, what worked and what did not.

Teaching portfolios consist of various pieces of evidence about your teaching such as course syllabi, outlines, lesson plans, course evaluations, and more. Instructors curate these pieces of evidence into a collection, giving them the chance to highlight their own growth and focus as educators. While student input may be incorporated as part of the portfolio, instructors can contextualize and respond to student feedback, giving them the chance to tell their own teaching story from a more holistic perspective.

Teaching portfolios encourage self-reflection, especially with guided questions or rubrics to review your work. In addition, an instructor might consider sharing their entire teaching portfolio or selected materials for a single course with colleagues and engaging in a peer review discussion. 

Examples and Resources:

Teaching Portfolio - Career Center

Developing a Statement of Teaching Philosophy and Teaching Portfolio - GSI Teaching & Resource Center

Self Assessment - UCLA Center for Education, Innovation, and Learning in the Sciences

Advancing Inclusion and Anti-Racism in the College Classroom Rubric and Guide

Course Design Equity and Inclusion Rubric

Teaching Demos or Peer Observation

Teaching demonstrations or peer classroom observation provide opportunities to get feedback on your teaching practice, including communication skills or classroom management.

Teaching demonstrations may be arranged as a simulated classroom environment in front of a live audience who take notes and then deliver summarized feedback. Alternatively, demonstrations may involve recording an instructor teaching to an empty room, and this recording can be subjected to later self-review or peer review. Evaluation of teaching demos will often focus on the mechanics of teaching especially for a lecture-based class, e.g. pacing of speech, organization of topics, clarity of explanations.

In contrast, instructors may invite a colleague to observe an actual class session to evaluate teaching in an authentic situation. This arrangement gives the observer a better sense of how the instructor interacts with students both individually or in groups, including their approach to answering questions or facilitating participation. The colleague may take general notes on what they observe or evaluate the instructor using a teaching rubric or other structured tool.

Peer Review of Course Instruction

Preparing for a Teaching Demonstration - UC Irvine Center for Educational Effectiveness

Based on Peer Feedback - UCLA Center for Education, Innovation, and Learning in the Sciences

Teaching Practices Equity and Inclusion Rubric

Classroom Observation Protocol for Undergraduate STEM (COPUS)

Student Learning Assessments

Student learning can vary widely across courses or even between academic terms. However, having a clear benchmark for the intended learning objectives and determining whether an instructor’s course as implemented helps students to reach that benchmark can be an invaluable piece of information to guide your teaching. The method for measuring student learning will depend on the stated learning objective, but a well-vetted instrument can provide the most reliable data.

Recommended steps and considerations for using student learning assessments to evaluate your teaching efficacy include:

Identify a small subset of course learning objectives to focus on, as it is more useful to accurately evaluate one objective vs. evaluating many objectives inaccurately.

Find a well-aligned and well-developed measure for each selected course learning objective, such as vetted exam questions, rubrics, or concept inventories.

If relevant, develop a prompt or assignment that will allow students to demonstrate the learning objective to then be evaluated against the measure.

Plan the timing of data collection to enable useful comparison and interpretation.

Do you want to compare how students perform at the start of your course compared to the same students at the end of your course?

Do you want to compare how the same students perform before and after a specific teaching activity?

Do you want to compare how students in one term perform compared to students in the next term, after changing your teaching approach?

Implement the assignment/prompt and evaluate a subset or all of the student work according to the measure.

Reflect on the results and compare student performance measures.

Are students learning as a result of your teaching activity and course design?

Are students learning to the degree that you intended?

Are students learning more when you change how you teach?

This process can be repeated as many times as needed or the process can be restarted to instead focus on a different course learning objective.

List of Concept Inventories (STEM)

Best Practices for Administering Concept Inventories (Physics)

AAC&U VALUE Rubrics

Rubric Bank | Assessment and Curriculum Support Center - University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa

Rubrics - World Languages Resource Collection - Kennesaw State University

Student Surveys or Focus Groups

Surveys or focus groups are effective tools to better understand the student experience in your courses, as well as to solicit feedback on how courses can be improved. Hearing student voices is critical as students themselves can attest to how course activities made them feel, e.g. whether they perceive the learning environment to be inclusive, or what topics they find interesting.

Some considerations for using student surveys in your teaching include:

Surveys collect individual and anonymous input from as many students as possible.

Surveys can gather both quantitative and qualitative data.

Surveys that are anonymous avoid privileging certain voices over others.

Surveys can enable students to share about sensitive experiences that they may be reluctant to discuss publicly.

Surveys that are anonymous may lend to negative response bias.

Survey options at UC Berkeley include customized course evaluation questions or anonymous surveys on bCourses, Google Forms, or Qualtrics. 

Some considerations for using student focus groups in your teaching include:

Focus groups leverage the power of group brainstorming to identify problems and imagine possible solutions.

Focus groups can gather both rich and nuanced qualitative data.

Focus groups with a skilled facilitator tend to have more moderated responses given the visibility of the discussion.

Focus groups take planning, preparation, and dedicated class time.

Focus group options at UC Berkeley include scheduling a Mid-semester Inquiry (MSI) to be facilitated by a CTL staff member.

Instructions for completing question customization for your evaluations as an instructor

Course Evaluations Question Bank

Student-Centered Evaluation Questions for Remote Learning

Based on Student Feedback - UCLA Center for Education, Innovation, and Learning in the Sciences

How Can Instructors Encourage Students to Complete Course Evaluations and Provide Informative Responses?

Student Views/Attitudes/Affective Instruments - ASBMB

Student Skills Inventories - ASBMB

How might I get started?

Self-assess your own course materials using one of the available rubrics listed above.

Schedule a teaching observation with CTL to get a colleague’s feedback on your teaching practices and notes on student engagement.

Schedule an MSI with CTL to gather directed student feedback with the support of a colleague.

Have more questions? Schedule a general consultation with CTL or send us your questions by email ( [email protected] )!

References:

Evaluating Teaching - UCSB Instructional Development

Documenting Teaching - UCSC Center for Innovations in Teaching and Learning

Other Forms of Evaluation - UCLA Center for Education, Innovation, and Learning in the Sciences

Evaluation Of Teaching Committee on Teaching, Academic Senate

Report of the Academic Council Teaching Evaluation Task Force

Teaching Quality Framework Initiative Resources - University of Colorado Boulder

Benchmarks for Teaching Effectiveness - University of Kansas  Center for Teaching Excellence

Teaching Practices Instruments - ASBMB

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Non Exam Assessment (NEA) or Coursework

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Non-exam Assessment, A guide for Parents

Non exam assessment: a guide for parents, what is non exam assessment.

Non Exam Assessment or NEA has replaced what used to be known as “Coursework”. In essence they are pretty much the same thing, in other words,  research – or project-based work – that counts towards a student’s final grade. It is considered to be an excellent way for students to demonstrate the skills and knowledge they have gained throughout a course and their ability to conduct independent research and write up their own project. Completing the NEA will help a student gain valuable life and work skills and for our students it is done at home. Students are encouraged to use research resources such as textbooks, journals, TV, radio and the internet and importantly to learn how to attribute and reference them.

Which subjects have NEA?

Currently the subjects which we offer with part assessment by NEA are;

GCSE; English (AQA), this NEA is not written work, it is an oral test

A LEVEL; English Language, English Literature and History (all AQA)

Entry for these subjects has to be made through Oxford Open Learning where you will be entered as an internal candidate by our Examination Officer, Jenny Booth ( [email protected] tel; 01865 798022) or through Tutors and Exams if there is a centre near you.

How is the exam entry made?

At the same time as you make your exam entry with us (by the end of January at the latest), you will also need to find another centre in your own locality which will be willing to be your “ host centre ” for the written part of the exam. You do this by following the same instructions we give for finding any exam centre but obviously you will need to explain that OOL will make your actual exam entry and that your local centre will only need to “host” your written exam using the transfer of entry system.

This means that OOL/OHS will be responsible for; making your examination entry, helping you to transfer your entry to the host centre, dealing with supervising, authenticating and marking your NEA, helping with enquiries about results and providing your results slip and certificates. All payment for this will be made to us.

The “host centre” which you will need to find and contact as early as possible will have to be prepared to accept your transfer of entry and allow you to sit the written exams with them. The fee that you will have to pay to the host centre should therefore only be for their administration time and invigilation of the written papers.

If you choose to sit with Tutors and Exams and they are an especially good option if you have SEN requirements, then the process is different. You will make your entry directly with them and no hosting or transfer will be needed. Your Oxford tutor will still mark your coursework.

What rules do students have to follow?

The NEA must be a student’s own original work, and they will have to sign a declaration to their examination board stating that this is the case. Tutors also have to sign the declaration to confirm that the work is the student’s own. This is called “authenticating” the work. Rules regarding submission are the same as for Coursework and are shown on the back of the enrolment form which students/guardians have to sign before starting our courses.

You must always be aware that the NEA is meant to show the student’s own ability to complete a project using their initiative and resources.  This means that other people should not have a direct input and the more help the student has from their tutor, the stricter the tutor will have to be when marking the work . In other words there will be a fine balance between the amount of help given and the amount of marks which have to be forfeited because of this help. You should discuss this carefully and in detail with the tutor to make sure it is fully understood. You should also download and read the JCQ document; “ Information for Candidates – non-examination assessments “.

Rules for Authentication of your NEA

If your subject has a written NEA assessment then there are strict rules that you and we must abide by to satisfy the Awarding Body and JCQ.

If you do not follow these rules then your tutor will not be able to authenticate and mark your coursework/NEA.

1, You must have regular contact with your tutor by telephone/Skype and email throughout your study time. (If you do not speak to your tutor until you try to submit your NEA, the tutor will be unable to accept it.)

2, You must complete at least 4 Tutor Marked Assignments, a plan and a draft before your tutor can consider authenticating your NEA. Submitting all of your TMAs together just before, or at the same time as your NEA will not be acceptable. (Please be aware that 4 TMAs is the minimum for authenticating your work, it is certainly not enough to secure a good exam grade as there will be 19 or 20 TMAs in total. )

3, Your tutor should supervise the planning of your NEA and see a draft essay which will be checked for plagiarism.

4, Your NEA and the correctly signed form(s) must be with your tutor by the OOL deadline. This is the  15th March and it is not negotiable for any reason . ( Do not assume that you can work to AQA’s deadline, this will be too late.)

5, When you have submitted your NEA you must be able to answer in depth questions about your ideas, your sources and how you came to your conclusions. This should be a telephone or Skype interview and not email. We have to be assured that the work was produced by you and not plagiarised or written by someone else. ( We and AQA have various methods of checking for plagiarism and they are used rigorously.)

6, Your tutor may refuse to authenticate your NEA if you do not follow any of these rules. In this case your work will be returned to you and AQA will be informed. We may refuse to provide any further tuition.

7, We will inform you when we have received your NEA and also of the mark you have been awarded.

8, If you have a problem with the mark that you receive, you will be able to question the assessment process before exam board moderation but you may not question the mark awarded. This is covered in Oxford Open Learning’s Internal Appeals Procedure.

9, The AQA moderating process may lead to changes in your mark but this is beyond the control of OOL.

How can I support my child?

You can encourage your child to plan their project in good time, talk to their tutor in detail, use a variety of sources which must be properly referenced, hand work in on time, and stick to the rules especially those regarding plagiarism. Together with providing a quiet place to study, this will help them to achieve their best. If your child often completes work at the last minute you could discuss with them how and when they plan to do their coursework. Encourage them to think about the project as early as possible so that the tutor has time to comment on their plan and draft and if things have gone wrong they can still be altered. This is especially important for distance learners as the deadlines are early and rules are strict.

How much can the tutors, or I, help?

Tutors can provide guidance on suitable titles/topics and what should be included in coursework projects and the planning. They can also explain what the Assessment Objectives are and what the exam board will be looking for when the project is being marked. However, the teacher cannot tell students exactly how to do the work or specifically what corrections to make – the point of coursework is for your son or daughter to work independently. You can encourage your child to do well and you and the tutor can provide them with guidance and access to resource materials. You must not put pen to paper – you must not write the coursework. You can discuss the project with them but you must not give direct advice on what they should, or should not write and nor can the tutor.

If your child is not sure how to complete their coursework then encourage them to speak to their tutor to get help. Planning and a “tight” plan are key. You and the tutor can suggest particular books that they might read, or discuss how to search the internet for relevant information. You should also encourage your child to express themselves clearly and most importantly to keep the AOs (Assessment Objectives) in mind. Accurate spelling, punctuation and grammar are also very important. However, always bear in mind that the more help the tutor gives, the more strictly they will have to mark the final submission.

Please also bear in mind that if the tutor believes that the work submitted is of a higher standard than they would expect they will have to question the student very closely to establish that someone else did not provide substantial help.

Are students allowed to quote from books or the internet?

Students can refer to research, quotations or evidence, but they  must  list and reference their sources. The sources could be anything – for example, books, internet sites, or television programmes.

Students must not plagiarise, copy, purchase essays, or collude with anyone else. This is considered to be cheating and could lead to your son or daughter being disqualified. There are now very sophisticated internet sites which we and the exam boards use to check work for plagiarism.

Encourage your child to use their own words as much as possible. If they do want to quote or refer to others’ work, tell them to use quotation marks and provide appropriate references. If your child is unsure on how to reference different sources then their tutor should be able to provide examples of good and bad referencing. By referencing their sources correctly your child will avoid being accused of cheating.

Who marks the NEA?

The NEA will be marked by your OHS tutor, checked by the Head of Department and then possibly checked again by AQA. If you have a problem with the marking of the NEA you must follow the “Internal Appeals Procedure” shown in our policy document.

How is cheating detected?

Our tutors have to authenticate the work produced. In other words they have to say that to the best of their knowledge it was produced by the student concerned. To do this the tutor and student have to follow strict guide lines, including the tutor having seen at least 4 Tutor Marked Assignments, a plan and a draft submission of the project. Tutors become familiar with their students’ work as well as books on specific subjects and they will be able to tell if the student did not do the work, or if the work was copied from another source.  Exam boards and OHS also routinely use plagiarism software to carry out checks on coursework/NEAs.

Encourage your child to complete their work honestly and follow the rules. By taking the time and choosing a topic that interests them, your child will learn to study independently, research different areas and present different types of projects. These skills will all be valuable when they go to university or enter the world of work.

What happens if a student breaks the rules?

There are a number of things that could happen. The relevant exam board decides which action is appropriate, but the student may not receive a mark for the work, may be disqualified from the whole qualification or part of it, or be barred from entering a qualification with a particular exam board for a period of time.

Please go to the “ NEA Guidelines ” section, in the Student Information part of www.ool.co.uk for more information on this topic.

Coursework and NEAs  take time and effort, and because it is a substantial part of your child’s final grade it is important that they do as well as they can. You can help by providing a quiet place to work, encouraging them to do their best, begin early and hand their work in on time. Please remember however that because you have chosen distance learning, there are strict rules that our tutors must adhere to which may seem harsher than those followed in everyday contact in school.

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The language surrounding assessment can be complex: specific terms are often used to describe assessment-related practices, and some terms have several different meanings attached to them. This variety is found across the higher education sector as well as within Cambridge.

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Course Evaluation: A Comprehensive Guide to Assessing your Training

March 3, 2023

Jen Avelino

Course evaluation is a powerful training tool that’s very much trusted in the world of Learning and Development (L&D). Mainly, it's used to assess the effectiveness of a course or training program, identify any potential knowledge gaps that may already exist within the team, and track each of your team member's learning progress.

If you’re planning to include a course evaluation in your next training program, then you’re at the right place! In this article, we’ll dig deeper into the meaning of course evaluation and the importance it plays to increase your training’s value and success. We'll also list down some tips on how you can take advantage of the award-winning training app, EdApp, to evaluate your training. 

What is course evaluation and why is it important

Course evaluation is the process of collecting feedback from learners, usually to assess the quality of a training course or program and get a better look at their learning experiences. 

There are two specific types of course evaluation: formative evaluation and summative evaluation.

Formative evaluation often takes place during the early part of a training course. The primary goals of this type of course evaluation, usually, are to identify your learners’ strengths and weaknesses and determine whether your training method is effective or not. The data from the course reviews can be used to improve your current course content and design, maximizing the learning experience of your team moving forward. 

Summative evaluation, on the other hand, is delivered at the end of a course or training program. It’s usually considered the most challenging but also the most crucial part of training as it will determine the overall effectiveness of your program. It will also show you whether or not your employees have actually gained something from their training. 

How to conduct an effective course evaluation

Here’s a step-by-step guide on how you can conduct an effective course evaluation:

Step 1: Start by identifying the objectives of your course evaluation

Make sure to define the objectives first before creating your course evaluation. What does your course evaluation serve to accomplish? Do you intend to assess the effectiveness of the content or the course design? This step will help you design good course evaluation questions that'll give you useful insights. 

Step 2: Choose the right course evaluation method

There are different approaches that you can take to evaluate your course’s effectiveness. You can give a couple of survey questions during your team's training, or reinforce course quizzes after taking their course. Otherwise, you can gather them in person and collect their feedback in real-time. For smaller groups, you can also schedule a 1:1 meeting with your team members. 

Look at the pros and cons of each course evaluation method and select which is the most efficient and effective way to achieve your evaluation's objectives.

Step 3: Keep your course evaluation clear and concise

As a rule of thumb, your course evaluation should be clear and concise. Use simple language and a consistent tone of voice so your learners can easily understand the questions and give accurate responses.

Step 4: Collect and analyze the data

After distributing your course evaluation, it’s time to collect and analyze the data. Look for specific patterns and trends, then use them to enhance your present or future training content, course design, and delivery methods. 

How to use EdApp for your course evaluation

In this section, we’ll show you how you can use the award-winning training platform EdApp to create effective course evaluations. 

Create visually appealing course evaluation surveys

EdApp is widely recognized for its easy-to-use course creator tool, which can be used not only to build courses but also course evaluation surveys. The best thing about this tool is that it’s heavily template-based, meaning, you’ll never start with a blank page. 

From its template library, you’ll find a series of beautiful survey templates that you can use to collect your learners’ feedback. Among the most popular course evaluation sample is the free-text survey template, which allows learners to give their insights using their own words. There’s also a multiple-choice survey template designed to collect straightforward responses from the learners, and the slider survey template to rate their course understanding on a scale of zero to five. 

These course evaluation surveys can be added between or after your course lessons. Alternatively, you can also create a whole new course containing just your course evaluation. The slides can be customized using your branding color and theme, plus, you can add your company logo to make your course evaluations more personalized.

Create better course evaluations with EdApp today.

Evaluate your team’s understanding through Rapid Refresh

Rapid Refresh is an in-built quiz maker by EdApp that transforms course assessments into interactive quizzes. They're auto-generated into gamified templates that are made to better engage learners as they answer their quizzes.

These quizzes are sent automatically to your learners’ devices in an interval predetermined by you – whether it’s before, during, or after their training sessions. The results of the course assessment will help you evaluate your team’s understanding of their training and find and fix knowledge gaps quickly.

Use Analytics to evaluate your course performance

EdApp also takes pride in its powerful analytics suite that can automatically collect and record all the responses from both your course evaluation surveys and Rapid Refresh quizzes. This removes all the headaches of manually reviewing and sorting through each learner's responses and answers, giving you more time to focus on your other tasks. If you need a copy of the raw data for further analysis, you can also export your survey responses in CSV and XLS formats. 

Enable discussion for real-time feedback

Another EdApp feature that you’ll find helpful for your course evaluation is its Discussion feature. Here, you can post your course evaluation question in a forum style and have your team comment on their feedback and even suggestions in real-time. This will help you easily find out what part of your training works and what doesn’t, so you can improve it for next time. 

The discussion method, unlike surveys, feels more casual since your learners can also interact with one another as they answer your course evaluation. It helps promote a sense of community where everyone in your team feels more connected to your training course. 

Jen is a learning expert at EdApp, a mobile-based training platform that helps corporates and businesses bring their training solutions to the next level. She carries an extensive writing experience in a variety of fields, including architecture, the gig economy, and computer software. Outside of work, she enjoys her free time watching her favorite series and documentaries, reading motivational books, and cross-stitching.

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What does it mean to be “pre-law”?

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If you’re considering heading to law school after undergrad, you may be wondering what it means, exactly, to be a pre-law student. Rather than a rigid and prescriptive academic pathway, being pre-law can be considered a “state of mind” that indicates a future academic goal. There is no one way to prepare well for law school!

Since there are no prerequisites for law school, you can feel free to explore things academically and declare a major that truly aligns with your interests and strengths. Not only are you more likely to do well in coursework you care about, chances are you’ll get more out of it. Law schools will look to see that you’ve performed well and challenged yourself academically, in whatever path you’ve chosen.

The American Bar Association says, “The ABA does not recommend any undergraduate majors or group of courses to prepare for a legal education. Students are admitted to law school from almost every academic discipline. You may choose to major in subjects that are considered to be traditional preparation for law school, such as history, English, philosophy, political science, economics or business, or you may focus your undergraduate studies in areas as diverse as art, music, science and mathematics, computer science, engineering, nursing or education. Whatever major you select, you are encouraged to pursue an area of study that interests and challenges you, while taking advantage of opportunities to develop your research and writing skills. Taking a broad range of difficult courses from demanding instructors is excellent preparation for legal education. A sound legal education will build upon and further refine the skills, values, and knowledge that you already possess.”

It’s a common misconception that pre-law students should be or are expected to be involved in law adjacent activities. Many students think they need to give Mock Trial or the Undergraduate Law Journal a go. If these endeavors interest you, great! But if you’re more drawn to clubs that have little or nothing to do with law, that’s great too! The truth is that you should engage in extracurricular activities that you connect with, and you’ll be better for it.

Law schools are interested in the skillset you’ve developed through your academic and extracurricular pursuits, whatever they may be. Building skills in oral communication, writing, research, problem solving, listening, critical analysis, and leadership can happen just as equally as a political science or theater major and just as easily as a law journal editor or dance team captain.

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Here's what happens if Trump can't pay his $454 million bond

Andrea Bernstein

Rachel Treisman

Forty Wall Street, a Trump-owned building, stands in downtown Manhattan. Former President Trump says he can't secure a bond to appeal the $454 million penalty in his civil fraud case. But New York Attorney General Letitia James says she is prepared to seize the former president's assets, including the building at 40 Wall Street, if he is unable to pay. Spencer Platt/Getty Images hide caption

Forty Wall Street, a Trump-owned building, stands in downtown Manhattan. Former President Trump says he can't secure a bond to appeal the $454 million penalty in his civil fraud case. But New York Attorney General Letitia James says she is prepared to seize the former president's assets, including the building at 40 Wall Street, if he is unable to pay.

Former President Donald Trump needs to arrange a $454 million bond to comply with a New York court ruling in less than a week, but the presumptive Republican presidential nominee says he can't find a company to put up the bond.

Trump's lawyers are asking an appeals court to stay the judgment, but the clock is ticking.

How did Trump come to owe the state of New York some $454 million?

Trump ordered to pay over $355M for fraudulent business practices in New York

This is the ruling that Judge Arthur Engoron issued last month , after finding that Donald, Eric and Donald Trump Jr., along with Trump Organization employees, engaged in a decade-long conspiracy to lie about the value of their assets.

In New York, if you make money by persistently committing fraud, you owe the ill-gotten portion back to the state. In this case, Judge Engoron determined that Donald Trump made over $350 million more than he should have if he'd been honest and when you add in interest, you get to $454 million.

Why does Trump have to come up with the money now?

Trump doesn't have to actually pay that money now, but he has to get a company to make a guarantee to the court that they will pay the money if he loses his appeal. That's the bond part.

But to get a bond, you have to put up assets, and in a court filing Monday Trump lawyers said they'd approached 30 companies but that getting a bond was a "practical impossibility," because they'd need a billion dollars in cash, which they don't have.

Trump unable to post $450M bond in New York fraud case, his lawyers say

They submitted an affidavit from an insurance executive who had testified at trial, and whom the trial judge had already discredited.

Trump says he's a billionaire. Why can't he just come up with the money himself?

Trump said during a deposition for this case, taken about a year ago, that he had plenty of cash. He said, "I believe we have substantially in excess of $400 million in cash ." And, he added, it's "going up very substantially every month."

News organizations have estimated that Trump actually has about $300 million in liquid assets — but he already had to set aside $100 million or so to put up a bond to pay the verdict in the E. Jean Carroll civil case . The rest of his money is largely tied up in buildings and golf courses, and while he could sell a property, that can't happen right away. Trump said Tuesday that would be a "fire sale," though he said many times during the trial he could always find a buyer to pay top dollar.

Jury orders Trump to pay $83 million for defaming columnist E. Jean Carroll

While Trump's political action committees have spent millions of dollars on his legal fees, they're unlikely to be of help to him in this case because of campaign finance laws .

Trump has accused the judge in the case of trying to take away his rights, posting on social media that any assets he may be forced to sell would be gone even if he ultimately wins his appeal.

That's a concern that any defendant could raise, whether they're liable for $450 or $450 million, says Adam Pollock, a former assistant attorney general in New York.

"But if you want to bond the appeal — stop enforcement of the judgment — you have to put up the full amount," he told Morning Edition . "That's what the law says. And that's a policy decision that Albany has made."

The deadline is Monday. What does Trump do if the appeals court doesn't rule his way?

He can appeal to New York's highest court and ask that court to stay the judgment. If they don't, he can ask a benefactor or he could try and stall some more until he comes into money from the upcoming sale of his social media company, or he could — though it has many disadvantages — declare bankruptcy.

But New York Attorney General Letitia James has been clear: If Trump doesn't pay, she will move to seize his assets.

"If he does not have funds to pay off the judgment, then we will seek judgment enforcement mechanisms in court," she said. "And we will ask the judge to seize his assets."

Trump's noncash assets run to $3 billion, Forbes estimates, so there's plenty of value there. The law limits the AG to seizing properties that were a part of the case, but there's about two dozen of those, everything from the Doral Golf Club to 40 Wall Street to Trump Tower. She's not limited to New York properties, though there are extra steps if she chooses to go out of state.

She could, in theory, send a sheriff or a marshal to enforce the judgment, and that brings on another legal process with many more opportunities for delay.

Can Trump be forced to pay up?

James can begin enforcement of the judgment immediately after the 30-day grace period expires next week, says Pollock. And there are several devices she can use to try to get him to pay.

For one, he says, she could serve Trump a restraining notice that would restrict his spending in other areas until he pays his bond.

"The restraining notice would say: 'Don't spend money, don't fill up your jet at the pump, until you pay the state of New York, or you'll be held in contempt of court,' " Pollock says. "And my impression is that ... Engoran, the judge here in New York, would be quick to hold him in contempt of court."

He says it's theoretically possible that James' could consider settling, especially if Trump were to write a check for something like $250 million. But short of that, he doesn't see any reason for her to proactively lower his bond, especially since she has the tools to go into banks and drain his accounts.

"The entire trial was effectively a roadmap to his financial assets," Pollock adds. "She can now send out a sheriff or a marshal of the city of New York to go walk into a financial institution holding what's known as an execution and empty his bank account short of $3,000, which is the statutory floor."

Pollock acknowledges that Trump has said he doesn't have $450 million in cash. But if he wants to stave off enforcement, "he needs to find a way to raise it."

• Letitia James
• court ruling
• Donald Trump

Olivia Munn Says Breast Cancer Risk Assessment Score ‘Saved’ Her Life—What to Know About the Tool

Experts explain how the tool works and why it’s so important.

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Who should use the breast cancer risk assessment tool?

What does my breast cancer risk assessment tool score mean, the bottom line.

• Olivia Munn revealed that she was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a double mastectomy last year.
• Her diagnosis came after calculating her Breast Cancer Risk Assessment Tool score.
• Experts explain how to use the tool to know your own risk.

In an Instagram post , Olivia Munn recently revealed that she was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a double mastectomy last year, just two months after testing negative for the BRCA gene (the most well-known breast cancer gene). It was ultimately the Breast Cancer Risk Assessment Tool that the 43-year-old actress says “saved” her life.

Munn recounted that in 2023, she had proactively taken “a genetic test that checks you for 90 different cancers” and tested negative for all, including BRCA (the most well-known breast cancer gene). That same winter, the actress also had a “normal mammogram,” according to her Instagram post.

Munn explained that what “saved” her life was the decision by her OB/GYN to calculate her Breast Cancer Risk Assessment Tool score, despite having no physical signs of breast cancer. Her score revealed that her lifetime risk of developing breast cancer was 37%. At this time, Munn has not shared why her doctor decided to calculate her score, aside from assumed preventive care reasons.

The results of the score led to Munn having an MRI, ultrasound, and biopsies—after which she ultimately learned she had Luminal B cancer, “an aggressive, fast-moving cancer,” in both breasts, per her post.

“I’m lucky,” Munn said. “We caught it with enough time that I had options. I want the same for any woman who might have to face this one day.”

But what is the breast cancer risk assessment tool, and should you calculate your score? Experts explain.

What is the breast cancer risk assessment tool?

The Breast Cancer Risk Assessment Tool (BCRAT), also known as the Gail Model, is one of the most common and popular tests used to identify those women at risk for breast cancer, says Sherry Ross, M.D. , women’s sexual health expert and author of she-ology and the she-quel . “This model looks at a woman’s personal information, including age, age at the start of menstruation, age at first live birth of a child, number of first-degree relatives (mother, sister, daughters) with breast cancer, number of previous breast biopsies (whether positive or negative), the presence of atypical, hyperplasia on a biopsy, race, and ethnicity.” All these variables are considered, and a risk score is given to the patient to identify if there is an increased risk for breast cancer, Dr. Ross explains.

The BCRAT, which takes as little as five minutes to complete, provides the probability or chance of breast cancer within the next five years as well as up to age 90, says Ruth Oratz, M.D. , breast medical oncologist at NYU Langone Health’s Perlmutter Cancer Center.

Anyone who is curious about their risk of developing breast cancer should use the tool. Having information empowers patients, says Dr. Oratz. “It is very important for people to be aware of their health risks, their family history, and their own personal medical conditions, as all of these things can affect the risk of developing cancer,” she explains.

In general, a five-year risk score of 1.67% or higher increases the risk of breast cancer, says Dr. Ross. “Once the score is determined, discussing the next steps with your healthcare provider allows for a breast cancer surveillance roadmap to be created,” she explains. If it’s determined that a patient is high risk, additional testing including a yearly breast ultrasound, breast MRI, genetic testing, preventative medication, lifestyle modifications, and other risk-reducing strategies are recommended under the guidance of a healthcare specialist, says Dr. Ross.

If you have a family history of breast or ovarian cancer , have a genetic mutation of the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene associated with breast or ovarian cancer, a history of receiving radiation for the treatment of Hodgkin lymphoma or other significant risk factors, you should ask your healthcare provider about additional screening methods, says Dr. Ross.

If you’re curious about your own risk, take a page out of Munn’s book, find out your score, and ask your doctor about next steps.

Being your best healthcare advocate when it comes to breast cancer detection cannot be over-emphasized, says Dr. Ross. “Incorporating breast cancer risk assessment tools increases your risk for early detection.” When it comes to breast cancer, prevention with lifestyle modifications with regular yearly mammogram screening allows for early detection, proactive management, and successful treatment outcomes, she adds.

Madeleine, Prevention ’s assistant editor, has a history with health writing from her experience as an editorial assistant at WebMD, and from her personal research at university. She graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in biopsychology, cognition, and neuroscience—and she helps strategize for success across Prevention ’s social media platforms. 

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What does Birmingham-Southern College closing mean for students still there? What we know

• Updated: Mar. 28, 2024, 10:56 a.m. |
• Published: Mar. 28, 2024, 10:09 a.m.

Birmingham-Southern College formed from a 1918 merger of Southern University, dating to 1856, and Birmingham College, dating to 1898, both founded by the Methodist Church. (Photo by Greg Garrison/AL.com)

• Rebecca Griesbach | [email protected]

With two months until Birmingham-Southern College closes its doors after nearly 168 years, officials are enlisting the help of local agencies and nearby colleges to ensure students and staff make a smooth transition.

In a newly released FAQ , BSC officials said they are working out transfer agreements with nearby colleges to ensure current students can complete their degrees on time.

Several colleges have already made offers to transferring BSC students – with some including hefty financial aid packages.

As of fall 2023, the private, liberal arts college enrolled 731 full-time students. As the college awaited a lifeline from the state legislature this year, several of those students told AL.com that they were worried about their options if the school were to shut down.

Some are on financial aid packages that might not transfer over. Others feared for their career and athletic prospects.

“I feel like I’m in quicksand,” one student, Daniel Johnson, told AL.com in November. “It’s like I had my chance to get out, but now I’m in too deep.”

BSC officials said they are still in talks with partnering institutions to ensure students can meet transfer deadlines and won’t have to duplicate coursework.

“Specifics will vary based on individual agreements, but the goal is to maximize transfer of credit to meet program requirements and minimize distance to the new institutions,” the FAQ reads. “That means these institutions will likely be in the Southeast.”

Leaders plan to meet with students when they return from spring break on Monday, April 1, to give more details and will hold additional advising meetings that week.

The school has scheduled a transfer fair on Friday, April 5 to help students weigh their options with other colleges. A spokeswoman said the school expects to have most transfer agreements finalized by then.

Other questions involving graduation ceremonies and funding plans, officials said, will be addressed in the days ahead.

Here’s what we know so far:

What will happen to student athletes? Is it too late to enter the transfer portal?

BSC student-athletes who wish to transfer schools can talk to other coaches now or as soon as they are in the transfer portal. The deadline to fill out a transfer portal application is April 15.

Eligible students must be in good academic standing at BSC, meaning students who are not on academic probation or suspension. They must also have met the minimum GPA requirements by the end of the spring semester.

All athletes are able to make a request with the transferring institution to file for an extension on their eligibility. Information on BSC student athletes will remain in the transfer portal until the athlete has matriculated to a new institution.

Will employees get severance payments?

Officials said they do not plan to provide severance to employees affected by the closure. BSC has 292 employees who were paid a total of nearly $21.7 million in salary and benefits in fiscal year 2022.

Staff will receive layoff notices 60 days prior to their termination date, as required by federal law. All employees must retrieve their belongings from the campus before it closes on May 31.

“For us to gracefully shut down our operations, we are not in a financial situation to offer any severance payment instead of the 60-day work-through notice period,” officials wrote.

The school said it will continue to provide health care and mental health benefits to employees through July 31, and is working to secure additional support from local agencies.

I’m a recent donor. Where is my money going?

The college is still accepting donations to “help fund a smooth transition for students, faculty and staff.”

Its annual day of giving, Forward Ever Day, is still scheduled for April 4. That money will go toward the rest of this year’s operating expenses, a spokeswoman said.

Officials said they are still working on a plan to manage the remaining endowed funds “in a way that honors the intentions of its donors.”

About $46 million in gifts and pledges have been committed toward a new endowment in the BSC Foundation. A spokeswoman told AL.com that the school has received about $10 million of that amount. The fund is separate from the school’s main endowment.

I graduate in the summer. Will the school hold a commencement ceremony?

Summer 2024 graduates will be able to either finish their coursework online or through a partnering institution.

A spokeswoman told AL.com that officials are still working on a plan for summer commencement and will let students know once details are in place.

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Baltimore bridge collapse wasn't first major accident for giant container ship Dali

Propulsion failed on the cargo ship that struck the Francis Key Bridge in Baltimore early Tuesday as it was leaving port, causing it to collapse into the frigid Patapsco River. Its crew warned Maryland officials of a possible collision because they had lost control.

“The vessel notified MD Department of Transportation (MDOT) that they had lost control of the vessel” and a collision with the bridge “was possible,” according to an unclassified Department of Homeland Security report. “The vessel struck the bridge causing a complete collapse.”

An official speaking on condition of anonymity confirmed to USA TODAY that the DHS’ Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency is working with federal, state, and local officials “to understand the potential impacts of this morning’s collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge.”

Clay Diamond, executive director, American Pilots’ Association, told USA TODAY power issues are not unusual on cargo ships, which are so large they cannot easily course correct.

“It’s likely that virtually every pilot in the country has experienced a power loss of some kind (but) it generally is momentary,” Diamond said. “This was a complete blackout of all the power on the ship, so that’s unusual. Of course this happened at the worst possible location.” 

The ship in Tuesday's crash, Dali, was involved in at least one prior accident when it collided with a shipping pier in Belgium.

That 2016 incident occurred as the Dali was leaving port in Antwerp and struck a loading pier made of stone, causing damage to the ship’s stern, according to VesselFinder.com, a site that tracks ships across the world. An investigation determined a mistake made by the ship’s master and pilot was to blame.

No one was injured in that crash, although the ship required repair and a full inspection before being returned to service. The pier – or berth – was also seriously damaged and had to be closed.

VesselFinder reports that the Dali was chartered by Maersk, the same company chartering it during the Baltimore harbor incident.

The 9-year-old container ship had passed previous inspections during its time at sea, but during one such inspection in June at the Port of San Antonio in Chile, officials discovered a deficiency with its "propulsion and auxiliary machinery (gauges, thermometers, etc)," according to the Tokyo MOU, an intergovernmental maritime authority in the Asia-Pacific region.

The report provided no other information about the deficiency except to note that it was not serious enough to remove the ship from service.

Follow here for live updates: Baltimore's Key Bridge collapses after ship strike; construction crew missing: Live Updates

Why did Dali crash into the Baltimore bridge?

Officials said Tuesday they’re investigating the collision, including whether systems on board lost electricity early Tuesday morning, which could be related to mechanical failure, according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to speak publicly.

Accidents at sea, known as marine casualties, are not uncommon, the source told USA TODAY. However, “allisions,” in which a moving object strikes a stationary one with catastrophic results, are far less common. The investigation of the power loss aboard the Dali, a Singapore-flagged vessel, will be a high priority.

In a video posted to social media, lights on the Dali shut off, then turned back on, then shut off again before the ship struck a support pier on the bridge.

Numerous cargo and cruise ships have lost power over the years.

The International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea requires all international vessels to have two independent sources of electricity, both of which should be able to maintain the ship's seaworthiness on their own, according to a safety study about power failures on ships , citing the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea.

The Dali's emergency generator was likely responsible for the lights coming back on after the initial blackout, Diamond said.

“There was still some steerage left when they initially lost power,” he said. “We’ve been told the ship never recovered propulsion. The emergency generator is a diesel itself – so if you light off the generator, that’s also going to put off a puff of exhaust.”

Under maritime law, all foreign flagged vessels must be piloted into state ports by a state licensed pilot so the Dali's pilot is licensed by Association of Maryland Pilots .

Diamond described the incident based on information from the Maryland agency that licensed the pilot aboard the ship. His organization represents that group and all other state piloting agencies in the US.

“The pilot was directing navigation of the ship as it happened,” he said. “He asked the captain to get the engines back online. They weren’t able to do that, so the pilot took all the action he could. He tried to steer, to keep the ship in the channel. He also dropped the ship’s anchor to slow the ship and guide the direction.

“Neither one was enough. The ship never did regain its engine power.”

How big is the Dali ship?

The Dali is a 984-foot container vessel built in 2015 by Hyundai Heavy Industries in South Korea. With a cruising speed of about 22 knots – roughly 25 mph. It has traveled the world carrying goods from port to port.

The ship, constructed of high-strength steel, has one engine and one propeller, according to MarineTraffic.com.

The Dali arrived in Baltimore on Sunday from the Port of Norfolk in Virginia. Before that, it had been in New York and came through the Panama Canal.

It remains at the scene of the collapse as authorities investigate.

Who owns and operates the Dali?

It is owned by the Singapore-based Grace Ocean Pte Ltd but managed by Synergy Marine Group, also based in Singapore. It was carrying Maersk customers’ cargo, according to a statement from the shipping company.

“We are deeply concerned by this incident and are closely monitoring the situation,” Maersk said in the statement. 

Synergy, which describes itself as a leading ship manager with more than 600 vessels under its guidance, issued a statement on its website acknowledging the incident and reporting no injuries among its crew and no pollution in the water. There were two pilots on board and 22 crew members in all, according to Synergy, all of them from India.

USA TODAY reached out to Synergy on Tuesday, but the company did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Contributing: Josh Susong

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Trump’s Bond in Civil Fraud Case Is Reduced to $175 Million

The former president was racing to secure a half-billion-dollar bond, but an appeals court lowered the amount. The surprise decision may help him stave off financial disaster.

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By Ben Protess and William K. Rashbaum

With Donald J. Trump on the clock to secure a nearly half-billion-dollar bond in his civil fraud case, a New York appeals court handed the former president a lifeline on Monday, saying it would accept a far smaller bond of $175 million.

The ruling by a panel of five appellate court judges was a crucial and unexpected victory for Mr. Trump, potentially staving off a looming financial disaster. Had the court denied his request for a smaller bond in the fraud case, which was brought by the New York attorney general, Mr. Trump risked losing control over his bank accounts and even some of his marquee properties.

For now, those dire outcomes might be on hold. If Mr. Trump obtains the smaller bond, it will prevent the attorney general from collecting while he appeals the $454 million judgment against him. The appeal in the case, in which a trial judge found that Mr. Trump fraudulently inflated his net worth, could take months or longer to resolve.

Mr. Trump has 10 days to secure the bond, and two people with knowledge of his finances said he should be able to, though doing so will effectively drain much of his cash. In order to obtain the bond — a promise from an outside company that it will cover his judgment if he ultimately loses the appeal and cannot pay — Mr. Trump will have to pay the company a fee and pledge about $200 million in cash and other investments as collateral.

Read the Ruling Lowering Trump’s Bond in the Civil Fraud Case

In a statement, Mr. Trump said he would “abide by the decision” and either post a bond or put up the money himself. He added that the appellate court’s decision to reduce the bond “shows how ridiculous and outrageous” the $454 million judgment against him is.

While the court, the Appellate Division in Manhattan, did not rule directly on the merits of Mr. Trump’s appeal, its ruling suggests that some of the judges could be sympathetic to Mr. Trump’s case, legal experts said.

But the decision in Mr. Trump’s favor was eclipsed only an hour later by a decision against him in one of his four criminal cases , underscoring the remarkable breadth of his legal problems as he seeks to reclaim the White House. In his Manhattan criminal case, the judge finalized an April 15 trial date, rejecting the former president’s effort to delay.

In the civil fraud case, Mr. Trump’s lawyers had asked the appeals court to either accept a smaller bond or pause the bond requirement altogether. They argued that the court would be likely to overturn the $454 million penalty, contending that it was “grossly disproportionate and unconstitutional.”

A spokeswoman for the attorney general, Letitia James, noted that Mr. Trump was “still facing accountability for his staggering fraud” and that the judgment “still stands.”

But Mr. Trump’s legal team celebrated the ruling. “The ruling today represents a great first step towards the ultimate reversal of a baseless and reckless judgment,” said Christopher M. Kise, one of his lawyers.

Mr. Trump has repeatedly attacked Ms. James and the trial judge, Arthur F. Engoron , as politically biased Democrats leading a witch hunt against him.

After Monday’s hearing, Mr. Trump held a news conference at 40 Wall Street, a crucial property in his portfolio and one that Ms. James signaled her intent to seize if Mr. Trump did not post bond.

Mr. Trump once again made broad assertions that the legal system was being weaponized by his political opponents, accusing Ms. James, Justice Engoron and the prosecutors in his criminal cases of trying to “take as much of his money as possible.”

Justice Engoron found Mr. Trump liable last month for conspiring to inflate his net worth to reap financial benefits, including favorable loans from banks. The $454 million judgment reflected the interest payments Mr. Trump saved by misleading his lenders, as well as profits from the recent sale of two properties.

Justice Engoron imposed several restrictions on Mr. Trump and his family business, barring him from running a New York company and obtaining a loan from a New York bank for three years. The same restrictions apply to his adult sons for two years. The judge also extended the appointment of an independent monitor, a watchful outsider to keep an eye on the family business.

In a surprise move, the appeals court on Monday paused most of those restrictions, save for the monitor.

Mr. Trump is fighting all of the punishments, but it was the financial penalty that he feared the most.

To secure the full $454 million bond, he would have needed to pledge even more than that — about $557 million, his lawyers said — in collateral to a bond company, including as much cash as possible and stocks and bonds he could sell quickly. He would have also owed the bond company a fee that could have amounted to nearly $20 million.

In a recent court filing, Mr. Trump’s lawyers called securing a bond for the full amount a “practical impossibility,” and revealed that he had approached more than 30 bond companies to no avail.

The reason was clear: Much of Mr. Trump’s wealth is tied up in the value of his real estate, which bond companies rarely accept as collateral. A recent New York Times analysis found that Mr. Trump had more than $350 million in cash as well as stocks and bonds, far short of the $557 million he would have needed to post in collateral.

He did, however, have enough collateral to recently post a $91.6 million bond in the defamation case he lost to E. Jean Carroll. And he appears to have enough to secure a $175 million bond in the case brought by Ms. James.

Still, doing so will eat into much of his stockpile of cash and other liquid investments. So long as Mr. Trump has to pledge money as collateral, he cannot use it to fund his family business or presidential campaign.

While the bond does not represent a fatal threat to the Trump Organization, it could curb any hope the company has of growing and effectively reduce Mr. Trump’s net worth.

But it could have been worse. Without a bond, Ms. James could have wielded broad authority to freeze various bank accounts, and she could have begun the long, complicated process of trying to seize some of Mr. Trump’s buildings, including an estate in Westchester County.

This was an alarming prospect for Mr. Trump , whose identity is linked to his properties. In a social media post on Monday, Mr. Trump referred to them as “my babies.”

It is unclear whether these same five judges will also hear Mr. Trump’s appeal, but David B. Saxe, a former judge on the appeals court that ruled on Monday, said that the court’s decision to short-circuit Ms. James’s collection efforts suggests that some of the judges were uncomfortable with Justice Engoron’s ruling.

“My view is that the court indicates it has difficulty with the breadth of the lower court’s decision,” said Mr. Saxe, who retired in 2017 after 36 years on the bench, 19 of them on the appeals court.

“They had other options available to them, and they issued a broad-based stay,” he continued, which he said suggests “that there is a view that they’re going to need to take a hard look at the lower court’s decision.”

Michael Gold contributed reporting.

Ben Protess is an investigative reporter at The Times, writing about public corruption. He has been covering the various criminal investigations into former President Trump and his allies. More about Ben Protess

William K. Rashbaum is a senior writer on the Metro desk, where he covers political and municipal corruption, courts, terrorism and law enforcement. He was a part of the team awarded the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News. More about William K. Rashbaum