ABSTRACT
This chapter is about the assessment of learning in universities, a topic which makes us think immediately of the examination system, the means by which the university makes judgements about whether students have met the requirements for passing subjects or gaining honours or distinctions. However, while this is a key aspect, assessment of learning in a university includes more than this. Boyle et al. (1995) argues that the three broad purposes of assessment can be expressed as providing information to enable judgements to be made in relation to the particular student, focusing and enhancing student learning while learning is taking place, and providing information to enable judgements and plans for improvement of educational programmes per se. We have suggested that most people think of the first of these purposes when they talk about what assessment is about. The other two purposes, as an aid to students during their learning and as a means for staff to make improvements to the educational programme as a whole are also important, and they are not unrelated to the first. This chapter is structured around the first purpose, but we will also discuss how appropriate assessment for that judgemental purpose can assist individual student learning and lead to quality improvement in the whole educational programme.
