Goodbye exams – Hello continuous e-assessment

As we get ready for the words to flow from all sides as the time for Clearing gets nearer I find the comments by Simon Lebus, chief executive of Cambridge Assessment, thought provoking to say the least. In brief he is saying that within the next 10 to 15 years we shall be saying goodbye to the old exam structure and moving toward a continuous assessment (ca) using e-technology for all exams. http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/jul/12/written-exams-computerised-testing As advisers I expect that we have all dealt with students who, despite producing good work, find sitting exams so stressful that it can seriously impact their grades. It will be interesting to see how this progresses as the classic “sit down and write for 3 hours” exam is often seen as a final quality proof of the work that a student has taken in and can use to answer the questions set. Thinking of some of the feeling towards ca we have seen so far it will not be a technical issue, but rather one of political perception.. It has been said that the current Government has concerns about ca and would like to look at introducing “controlled assessment”, which could be done in school and supervised like exams, while the Conservatives are reported as wishing to go return to the high stakes final exams that were traditional, as they feel the continuous assessment approach has lost confidence with people
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/a_level_gcse_results/article6220846.ece