Assessment of Student Learning

Abstract

This chapter overviews the traditional teacher-centered approaches to assessment that have dominated Saudi higher education, and then investigates the factors driving a recent paradigm shift towards contemporary student-centered and learning outcomes-based student assessment models. Saudi higher education institutions are still largely dominated by a norm-referenced assessment culture. In order to challenge this culture, the authors suggest that a more proactive approach to staff training and development is needed.

Authors’ Note

It has been difficult to undertake any rigorous and comprehensive analysis of the assessment of student learning for this chapter. With few exceptions, student assessment in Saudi universities supports a norm-referenced and summative model and has always done so. Essentially, assessment is seen as a way of rank ordering students based on what knowledge and skills they have attained by the end of their subject or programme of study. Formal testing remains the dominant way of collecting summative information in Saudi universities.

The purpose of assessing learning should, of course, not just be about ranking students in order of achievement: it can and should provide extremely valuable information about the success and appropriateness of teaching and learning approaches, both for teachers and students, and about the quality of curriculum development and delivery. Assessment models, therefore, should be developed in tandem with pedagogical practice and curriculum design and development, as part of an integrated strategy designed to improve the quality of teaching and learning. Unfortunately, we found almost no evidence of this occurring in Saudi Arabia, whether it be at the system, university, or individual classroom level.

What we did find was a number of enthusiastic Saudi academics who had read about, or were looking at, how they might use alternative assessment approaches. Unfortunately, very few of these academics were looking at customising assessment models compatible with the teaching and learning culture of their classroom or university. Rather, they were simply looking at borrowing ‘good ideas’ from the literature or international practice and ‘trying them out’, rather than seeking to use the ideas to develop genuine assessment models designed to meet the needs of the Saudi higher education system.

As a consequence, much of this chapter focuses on the nature of alternative assessment practices and models that have the potential to be customised as part of a strategic approach to improving the quality of teaching and learning in the Kingdom. The reader needs to be aware, therefore, that this chapter essentially conveys what Saudi academics are currently thinking about doing in student assessment, not what they are actually currently doing.