The Ins and Outs of Assessment Validation: How to Validate Assessments

The Ins and Outs of Assessment Validation: How to Validate Assessments

Blog Article

Among the numerous obligations RTOs face post-registration—annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, marketing compliance—validation is often the most dreaded.

Although we've written about validation many times, let’s redefine it. ASQA refers to validation as a quality review of the assessment process.

Validation is the process of confirming accurate areas in an RTO's assessment process and pinpointing elements for improvement. With a correct understanding of its components, it’s less daunting.

As stated in Clause 1.8 of the SRTOs 2015, RTOs must ensure their assessment systems, including RPL, comply with the training package requirements and adhere to the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

The standards specify that two types of validation need to be performed.

The initial assessment validation ensures your RTO's assessments comply with the training package requirements.

The second validation ensures assessments are conducted according to the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.

It suggests that validation takes place before and after the assessment. This article focuses on the first type—assessment tool validation.

Defining the Two Types of Assessment Validation

An Introduction to Assessment Validation

As previously discussed in our blogs, validation involves two processes: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.

Pre-assessment validation or verification, also known as assessment tool validation, relates to the first part of the clause, ensuring all unit requirements are met and workbooks are 100% compliant.

Post-assessment validation, in contrast, is about the implementation, requiring Registered Training Organisations to conduct assessments adhering to the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

Our focus in this article will be on assessment tool validation.

Conducting Assessment Tool Validation

Having reviewed the two types of validation, let’s dive into the specifics of assessment tool validation.

Timing for Conducting Assessment Tool Validation

The objective of assessment tool validation is to ensure that all elements, performance criteria, and performance and knowledge evidence are addressed by your assessment tools.

Hence, whenever new learning resources are bought, assessment tool validation should be carried out before students use them.

You don’t need to wait until your next 5-year validation schedule. Immediately validate new resources to ensure they’re ready for student use.

Nevertheless, this isn't the only reason to perform this type of validation. Conduct assessment tool validation also when you:

- update your resources
- your scope includes new training products
- course is reviewed against training product updates
- you identify your learning resources as a risk during your risk assessment

The Australian Skills Quality Authority employs a risk-based approach for regulating RTOs and expects regular risk assessments. Therefore, student complaints about learning resources are an ideal time to conduct assessment tool validation.

What Training Products Should Be Validated?

Bear in mind, this validation aims to ensure compliance of all learning resources before use. All RTOs are required to validate all unit resources.

What Do You Need for Assessment Tool Validation?

Training Materials

For validating your assessment tools, you will need the full array of your learning resources:

Mapping tool – the first document you should look at. It highlights which assessment items meet unit requirements, accelerating validation.

Learner/student workbook – validate its suitability as an assessment tool. Confirm that instructions are clear and answer fields are sufficient. This is a common problem.

Assessor guide/marking guide – ensure sufficient instructions for assessors and clear benchmarks for each assessment item. Clear benchmarks are vital for reliable assessment outcomes.

Other related resources – could include checklists, registers, and templates developed apart from the workbook and marking guide. Validate them to confirm they fit the assessment task and meet unit requirements.

Validation Team

Clause 1.11 outlines the criteria for validation panel members, specifying that validation can be done by one or more people. RTOs typically require all trainers and assessors to participate, occasionally inviting industry experts.

Collectively, your validation panel must have:

Vocational competencies and industry skills relevant to the unit being validated

Current knowledge and expertise in vocational teaching and learning

Any of the following training and assessment credentials:

TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or its replacement

Assessment validation tool/template
Having a validation tool helps you with both the validation process and documentation. Using a validation tool makes it easier to look at how each assessment item maps against each unit requirement.
Having a validation tool helps in both the validation process and documentation. It makes it simpler to see how each assessment item aligns with each unit requirement.
At the same time, it can serve as your document evidence that you have validated your resources before letting the students use them.
It also acts as evidence that you have validated your resources prior to student use.

ASQA does not provide a recommended or required template for assessment tool validation, but many templates are available online. These tools generally have validators review the tools as a whole to determine if they meet the principles of assessment.

Principles of Assessment Checklist Yes/No/Partially Comments
1. Fair
2. Flexible
3. Valid
4. Reliable

While such templates facilitate validation, they often result in judgment errors because there’s insufficient space for comments on each assessment item.

We strongly recommend using a more detailed template to inspect each unit requirement and the assessment items that map to them. Here is an example:

Element Performance Criteria Assessment Instructions Benchmarks Assessment Instrument Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What Should Be Inspected?

As noted in our blog post Common Problems In Assessment Tools, your assessment tools must ensure trainers follow assessment principles and evidence rules.

Assessment Basic Principles
Fairness – Is equal opportunity and access guaranteed for everyone in the assessment process?

Flexibility – Are various options provided in the assessment to demonstrate competence based on different needs and preferences?

Validity – Is the assessment measuring what it is supposed to measure? Is it a valid tool for assessing the required skill or knowledge?

Reliability – Will the assessment achieve the same results every time, regardless of who conducts the training? Will different assessors consistently make decisions on skill competence?

Fundamental Rules of Evidence

Validity – Is the evidence verifying that the candidate has the skills, knowledge, and attributes described in the unit of competency and associated assessment requirements?
Sufficiency – Is there enough evidence to ensure that the learner has the skills and knowledge required?
Sufficiency – Is the evidence enough to confirm the learner has the required skills and knowledge?

Authenticity – Is the assessment tool verifying that the work belongs to the candidate?

Currency – Do the assessment tools align with current units of competency and up-to-date industry practices?

Although these are regularly covered in VET professional development and nationally recognised training, numerous tools still struggle to meet these requirements.

To avoid employing learning resources that fail to meet all unit requirements, be sure to follow these guidelines:

Practice What You Preach

Take note of the verbs used in the unit requirements and make sure they are addressed by the assessment item. For instance, in the unit CHCECE032 Nurture babies and toddlers, one performance evidence requirement requires students to:

Complete each of the following at least once with two different babies under 12 months old in a safe environment, using age-appropriate verbal and non-verbal communication according to service and regulatory requirements:

change nappies

prepare bottles, feed infants from bottles, and clean equipment

solid food preparation and feeding babies

respond suitably to infant signs and cues

prepare and settle infants for sleep

monitor and promote age-appropriate physical exploration and gross motor skills

Having students explain changing nappies for babies under 12 months old doesn’t directly address the unit requirement. Unless it’s meant to assess underpinning knowledge (i.e., knowledge evidence), students should be carrying out the tasks.

Look Out for Plurals!
Pay attention to the numbers. In our example on one of the unit requirements of CHCECE032, this single unit requirement calls for the students to complete the tasks at least once on two different babies under 12 months of age. Having students complete the tasks listed twice on just 1 baby won’t cut it.
Notice the numbers. In the CHCECE032 example, one unit requirement requires students to complete the tasks at least once with two different babies under 12 months old. Doing the tasks twice with one baby doesn’t meet the requirement.

All or Not Competent

Pay attention to lists. As noted earlier, if students perform only half the tasks listed, it’s non-compliant. Each assessment item must address all requirements, or the student is not yet competent and the assessment tool is non-compliant.
Can you be more specific?
Clarify Further

Each assessment item must have clear and specific benchmark answers to guide the assessor’s judgment on the student’s competence. Therefore, it’s crucial that your instructions do not confuse students or assessors. For instance:
What kind of information can be included in a work package?
What information might be included read more in a work package?

The answer can include:

Required materials

Appropriate costs

Time allocated for activities

Designated roles and responsibilities

When an assessment item requires multiple answers, specify how many answers a student must provide. This way, your assessment remains reliable, and the evidence collected is valid.

The same applies to assessment items with double-barrelled questions or those that ask for multiple answers simultaneously. Such questions can confuse both students and assessors, as illustrated in the example below:

Name a hazard and/or environmental issue in the work area and choose the most effective hazard control hierarchy.

Answers could include, but are not limited to:

Weather conditions – isolation of work area, engineering controls, personal protective equipment

Work area and ground conditions – eliminating hazards, isolation, use of engineering controls

People – isolating, use of engineering controls, administrative controls

Structural hazards – substitution, isolation, engineering controls

Chemical hazards – isolating, engineering, administration

Equipment or machinery – isolation, use of engineering controls, administration

Avoiding double-barrelled questions makes it easier for students to answer and for assessors to judge competence accurately.

Seeing these requirements, you might think, “Don’t learning resource developers offer audit guarantees?” But such guarantees mean you must wait for an audit before rectifying noncompliance. This affects your compliance history, so it’s wiser to take the safe and compliant route.