Assessment of the Year Abroad in Modern Language Degrees
25-26 June 2010
Conference Information
Conference
The conference was organised by Dr Gabriela Meier, Research Officer at the University of Bath (Department of Education), as part of an internally funded research project into the assessment of the year abroad in modern language degrees. The conference took place over two half days on 25 and 26 June 2010 at the University of Bath. There were 61 participants (63 bookings from 34 institutions from the UK, the Netherlands, Spain and the USA). Prof. Jim Coleman gave a key note speech, which was followed by 16 presentations and two workshops, as can be seen from the conference programme attached.
LLAS contribution
The LLAS Subject Centre contributed in two important ways to the success of this conference. First, it financially supported the invitation Professor Jim Coleman, whose key note speech was subsidised by the Guest Speaker Fund. Separate from this, Dr Erika Corradini helped coordinate two workshops and LLAS paid the conference fees for the respective workshop leaders (Prof. Murray Pratt, Prof. Jim Coleman, Dr Erika Corradini). Gabriela Meier also facilitated one of the workshops, however, her expenses were covered by the conference budget at Bath. As you can see from the attached conference booklet, the LLAS logo was included in the paperwork, and information about the LLAS subsidy for the key note speech and the workshops was mentioned separately (see page 3 and 12).
Objectives
The conference had the purpose of exploring and sharing challenges, practices and solutions relating to the assessment of year abroad experiences, including Erasmus study and work placements, as well as British Council teaching assistantships.
Relevance
Many conference participants welcomed the opportunity to share information and learn from one another, since there was a shared feeling that to a certain degree year-abroad coordinators work in isolation in their respective universities. Some expressed the need to have follow-up conferences or seminars on this topic.
Main themes that emerged as important
- Workload
Any assessment model must be feasible within a tutor workload. The support and care made available to students depends on the number of students that are on their year abroad at any one time, as well as the students who are studying in the other year groups.
- Expectation management
This area emerged as an important area, and attention needs to be paid not just to practical but also to emotional and social expectations. Furthermore, the year abroad should not be advertised as potentially ‘the best time in someone’s life’ since this may lead to disappointment if the students is less satisfied with their stay abroad.
- Autonomous learning, learner responsibility
Ways of empowering and enabling students to formulate and review their own objectives and achievements, as well as to assess their own performance and that of others may need further exploration. This would make students more responsible for their own learning while reducing the teachers’ workload.
- Embedding the year abroad in the whole degree
The status of the year abroad has changed in recent decades, from an intercalary or gap year to an integral part of a language degree. To this end, learning in the different years was discussed. While in the first two years and the final year learning is largely guided by module specifications and tutors, while the year abroad requires self-guided autonomous learning competencies.
- Social interaction
The relevance of Jim Coleman’s concentric circle theory was stressed. The concentric circle theory describes social interaction in the host country into three groups: 1) people from the same (home) country, 2) international people, 3) local people (speakers of the target language). While especially Erasmus students find it easy to socialise in the first two circles, interaction in the 3rd circle is for many fraught with problems. Students may need some guidance, or at least awareness that interaction with the 3rd circle is an aim that they should actively pursue while they are away. If this is an aim, the question arises in what way it could be included in the assessment structure, if at all.
- ETCS credit transfer
This topic had been discussed controversially and the issue of comparability of academic rigour between partner universities has been raised. - Assessment instruments
Various assessment instruments were presented. These included:
o e-platforms
o portfolios
o oral assessment
o written assignments
Feedback
A number of people sent their thanks by email, and/or completed feedback forms. In summary, it can be said that the event was a success as is demonstrated by the quotes below:
Follow-up activities
The conference contributions are available from a website hosted by the University of Bath. Furthermore, based on the relevance of the topic an edited book on the topic of the year abroad is being arranged.
Gabriela Meier, 11 August 2010
