Quality assurance and safeguarding activities for the graduation process
What is meant?
The graduation projects are important for demonstrating that students have met the final attainment levels and are qualified to receive their diplomas.
Guidelines and a framework will be in place for this purpose. However, ensuring the quality of this process remains a challenging endeavor. In particular, ensuring the reliability of the grading. How can you ensure that the difference in grades is meaningful? Does the grade depend on who happened to be grading (inter-assessor reliability)?
Investigation, verification, and calibration activities within study programmes may help to explore and increase the reliability of these complex assessments. These activities can be initiated by programme management (from a quality assurance perspective), the Examination Board (from a safeguarding perspective), or both parties jointly. A programme committee can also play a role in this respect.
On the websites mentioned below, you can find helpful information and guidelines to investigate and ensure the quality of the graduation process, and to examine and enhance the assessment practice, to ensure that the grading of theses is done in a reliable and meaningful way.
The information and checklist were developed in a joint effort of the Educational Quality Assurance coordinator and the Teaching Academy staff of BMS, but made generally available to all faculties.
Website: Graduation process | Home
- Checklist to investigate the quality of the thesis process: checklist-graduation-process-oct25.docx
- Guidelines and tips for assessing graduation projects – How to enhance the reliability by way of investigation, verification, and calibration activities
(including tips for so-called "theses carousels" in different varieties): Enhancing the reliability of graduation projects assessment | Home
What kind of support do we provide?
The Educational Quality Assurance coordinator and/or the Teaching Academy staff can help you with setting up, revising, or reviewing your graduation process and/or the assessment practice. It can help you organize the discussions with stakeholders to exchange ideas and decide on what to focus on and what to consider when setting up an investigation or deciding upon and implementing measures for the programme.