Using the EAT (equity, agency, transparency) framework to promote inclusive assessment practices

This presentation demonstrated how learning developers can use Evans’s EAT framework (2022) to increase the accessibility, equity, and inclusivity of assessment practices by designing innovative activities that promote student assessment and feedback literacy. The activities showcased in this presentation were used in Academic Language and Literacy workshops at the University of Bristol, which played a central role in demystifying assessment and feedback processes for students at all levels of their academic journeys. Underpinning theories and practical applications from these workshops were explored for each of the three dimensions of the framework to demonstrate how this tool could be used to increase the transparency of assessment practices and empower students to take a more active role in the assessment and feedback process.

In terms of assessment literacy, the presentation proposed ways to improve students’ ability to generate internal feedback and self-regulate their learning (Nicol, 2021) through the discussion and evaluation of exemplars (Smyth, 2023) and the decoding of assessment briefs and marking criteria. Activities to increase students’ agentic engagement with feedback practices (Winstone et al., 2017) were also discussed, such as analysing tutor feedback to explore disciplinary practices and highlight the integral role of feedback in academic knowledge construction. The final part of the presentation focused on how to help students navigate the ever-increasing modular system of HE assessment design (Jessop and Tomas, 2017), so that they can make connections between assessments on different units and exploit central university resources to support their development.