Understanding Assessment with Deaf People

This work package examines the use of tests in the VOGS project and considers how this may be fitted to the planned model for employment counselling. Although there are reasons why normative testing may be useful for hearing people, the heterogeneity of the Deaf population, their relative low incidence and the different language and culture which they have, indicate that such tests (even where they exist) will be of limited value. The very fact that there are relatively few Deaf people in each Member State makes it very hard to see how any normative values for Deaf people can be applied to formal standardised tests. Where psychological tests are involved, a significant proportion of these are closed tests – and these are therefore only able to be applied by trained and certified psychologists. This places them out of reach of typical employment counsellors. Nevertheless a non-exhaustive examination of existing tests is provided and some issues are considered. In this document, alternative means of approaching this topic are also considered and the (Deaf) cultural issues examined. It becomes clear that the choice of tests is not the key aspect, but rather the atmosphere, assumptions and personnel who are engaged in the test process, are the major challenge for the VOGS initiative. The conclusion is that the VOGS procedure should be a set of guidelines relating to the process of guidance (assessment); it should give far more weight to in-job observation and support than to de-contextualised assessments. Where tests are specified these need to be approached with great caution in order to make them culturally fair and to ensure that decision-making is truly accessible to the Deaf members of the assessment team.