Authentic Assessment in Higher Education: Combining professional and academic standards into a coherent assessment framework

Authentic assessment in higher education motivates students and integrates employability into academic programmes. Authentic assessment arguably requires three elements: real-world practicality; cognitive challenge; and development of evaluative judgment. There is tension around the value of different kinds of knowledge and between academic and professional standards within authentic assessment. This tension is often most explicit for students completing a programme to gain accreditation against formal professional standards, for example to be a schoolteacher or nurse. Employability is one of the overlapping purposes of higher education but arguably so is global citizenship. In assessment in higher education we distinguish between ‘assessment criteria’ and ‘academic standards’. We also distinguish between ‘analytical’ and ‘holistic’ grading of student work. However, professional standards frameworks produced by national associations or government departments do not often adopt these concepts and may blur the distinction between criteria and standards. A case study of an undergraduate teacher education programme in England, using critical discourse analysis of documents and thematic analysis of interview and focus group data, reveals three strategies for programme teams in developing authentic assessment. First, a critical perspective on professional standards. Second, a shared discourse with employers. Third, positioning professional standards as a boundary-crossing artefact in university-employer partnerships