After gaining registration, RTOs need to monitor several aspects including annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, and marketing compliance, with validation being a major concern.
Although we have published several articles on validation, let’s revisit the term. ASQA describes 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.
Clause 1.8 of the 2015 SRTOs indicates that RTOs need to ensure their assessment systems, including RPL, are compliant with training package requirements and conducted in accordance with the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.
The standards mandate two types of validation.
The first type of assessment validation checks that your RTO's assessment aligns with the training package requirements in your scope.
The next validation ensures that assessments are conducted per the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.
This means we validate assessments both before and after they are conducted. This article will cover the first type—assessment tool validation.
Breaking Down the Two Types of Assessment Validation
The Meaning of Assessment Validation
As mentioned earlier and in our earlier blog entries, validation is divided into two parts: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.
Pre-assessment validation, also referred to as assessment tool validation, is related to the first part of the clause, ensuring all unit requirements are addressed and workbooks are entirely 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.
This discussion will center around assessment tool validation.
Steps for Conducting Assessment Tool Validation
With a clear understanding of the two types of validation, let’s focus on assessment tool validation.
Timing of Assessment Tool Validation
Assessment tool validation ensures that all elements, performance criteria, and performance and knowledge evidence are addressed by your assessment tools.
This implies that any time you get new learning resources, assessment tool validation must be done before they are used by students.
You don't have to wait until your next 5-year validation schedule. Validate new resources right away to ensure they’re appropriate for student use.
Nonetheless, there are other reasons to conduct this type of validation. Perform assessment tool validation when you:
- your resources get updated
- new training products get added on scope
- course is reviewed against training product updates
- identifying 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.
Selecting Training Products for Validation
It's important to remember this validation ensures that all learning resources are compliant before use. All RTOs need to validate resources for each unit.
Resources Required for Assessment Tool Validation
Instructional Resources
Since you are conducting assessment tool validation, you will need the entire suite of your learning resources:
Mapping tool – start with this document. It illustrates which assessment items address unit requirements, making validation quicker.
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 that instructions for assessors are sufficient and clear benchmarks for each assessment item are provided. Clear benchmarks are essential for reliable assessment outcomes.
Other related resources – such as checklists, registers, and templates created independently from the workbook and marking guide. Validate them to ensure they are suitable for the assessment task and address unit requirements.
Assessment Validation Team
Clause 1.11 specifies the criteria for validation panel members, indicating that validation can involve one or more persons. RTOs usually require all trainers and assessors to participate, sometimes including industry experts.
Your validation panel, as a group, must possess:
Vocational competencies and industry skills relevant to the unit being validated
Recent expertise and skills in vocational teaching and learning
Any one of the following training and assessment qualifications:
TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or its updated version
Assessment validation instrument/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.
A validation tool assists with the validation process and documentation. It makes it easier to view 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 serves as evidence that you have validated your resources before students use them.
ASQA does not specify a required template for assessment tool validation, but many templates are accessible online. These tools usually have validators review the tools as a whole to ensure they meet the principles of assessment.
Assessment Principles Guide Yes/No/Partially Comments
1. Fair
2. Flexible
3. Valid
4. Reliable
Although these templates ease the validation process, they can cause errors in judgment as there is minimal space for commenting on each assessment item.
It is highly recommended to use a more detailed template for inspecting each unit requirement and the assessment items that map to them. Below is an example:
Element Performance Criteria Assessment Directions Benchmarks Assessment Instrument Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What Requires Checking?
As detailed in our blog post Common Problems In Assessment Tools, it is crucial that your assessment tools enable trainers to adhere to assessment principles and evidence rules.
Essential Principles of Assessment
Fairness – Are equal opportunities and access ensured in the assessment process?
Flexibility – Does the assessment accommodate different options to demonstrate competence according to various needs and preferences?
Validity – Is the assessment testing what it is meant to test? Is it a valid tool for assessing the required skill or knowledge?
Reliability – Will the assessment produce the same results every time, regardless of who conducts the training? Will different assessors consistently decide on skill competence?
Basic Rules of Evidence
Validity – Is the evidence proof that the candidate possesses 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 adequate to ensure the learner has the required skills and knowledge?
Authenticity – Is the assessment tool ensuring that the work is the candidate’s own?
Currency – Do the assessment tools reflect current units of competency and modern industry practices?
Although these are frequently covered in VET professional development and nationally recognised training, many tools still struggle to meet these requirements.
To prevent using learning resources that do not address some unit get more info requirements, ensure you adhere to these guidelines:
Act on Your Words
Pay close attention to the verbs in the unit requirements and ensure they are addressed by the assessment item. For example, in the unit CHCECE032 Nurture babies and toddlers, one performance evidence requirement asks students to:
Perform 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 in accordance with service and regulatory requirements:
diaper changing
bottle preparation, bottle-feeding babies, and cleaning equipment
prepare solid food and feed infants
respond appropriately to baby signs and cues
prepare and settle infants for rest
monitor and encourage age-appropriate physical exploration and gross motor skills
Having students describe the nappy-changing process for babies under 12 months old doesn’t directly meet the unit requirement. Unless the unit requirement is meant to assess underpinning knowledge (i.e., knowledge evidence), students should be performing the tasks.
Plurals Matter!
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 our CHCECE032 example, one unit requirement asks students to complete the tasks at least once with two different babies under 12 months old. Doing the tasks twice with one baby is not sufficient.
Entire or Not Competent
Mind the lists. In the previous example, 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?
Could You Be Clearer?
Every assessment item must have clear and specific benchmark answers to guide the assessor’s judgment on student competence. Thus, make sure your instructions are not confusing for students or assessors. For example:
What kind of information can be included in a work package?
What information might be included in a work package?
The answer can include:
Needed resources
Related costs
Length of activities
Appointed roles and responsibilities
When an assessment item calls for several answers, indicate the number of answers required from a student. This way, your assessment remains reliable, and the evidence collected is valid.
The same applies to assessment items with double-barrelled questions or questions that ask for more than one answer simultaneously. These can confuse both students and assessors, as illustrated in the example below:
Name a hazard and/or environmental issue in the work area and pick the most effective hazard control hierarchy.
Answers might include, but are not limited to:
Weather conditions – isolation of work area, engineering controls, personal protective equipment
Work area and ground conditions – eliminating hazards, isolating, engineering controls
People – isolating, use of engineering controls, administration
Structural hazards – substitution, isolating, engineering controls
Chemical hazards – isolation, engineering, administration
Equipment or machinery – isolating, engineering, administration
Avoiding double-barrelled questions makes it simpler for students to answer and for assessors to accurately judge student competence.
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.