Professional Education : Assessment for development of professional competence in a culturally heterogeneous society

The project is to develop models to support students undertaking professional education in the areas of health, education and care in developing their professional competence. This takes place with the help of continuous assessment in simulated authentic situations. The project focuses on the following problems in professional education: a) The difficulty of uniting theory and practice into a whole in the courses of study b) The need to develop models for authentic professional situations, which are integrated into the courses of study c) The difficulty of forming a process of assessment that is relevant in relationship to the desired competence, and that does not only assess theoretical knowledge and technical skill d) The need to integrate assessment into the learning process e) The students’ need to develop the ability to assess their own competence on a continuing basis. Our courses of study need to improve in the following ways: a) Assessment of theoretical knowledge and of professional competence is often carried out separately. The two aspects are integrated all too seldom in assessment. Assessment is also carried out in totally different ways: Theoretical subjects are often assessed by means of written examinations with strict time limits, while professional competence is assessed using a longer process. The types of criteria used are different for the two assessments