Assessment of Accomplishments
There have been a number of areas of positive feedback for this approach including students, our own and other faculty. We believe that the basic concept is sound. We support the concept of multiple forms of assessment, at least in health sciences, where both quantitative knowledge and a more constructivist approach to problem-solving is necessary. This approach is reviewed extensively in an excellent review text (Denzin & Lincoln, 2000).
The concept of additional objective assessment in incorporated into the new COMPASS curriculum in the McMaster Medical Program (McMaster Undergraduate Calendar, 2005-2006). This is in addition to the traditional interpretivist assessment of individual performance in tutorial and later clinical settings. The latter evaluates a range of student skills in the context of a specific clinical problem.
However, what needs to be done is a more formal assessment of this and other teaching. This process generates further ideas and clarifies thinking.
All of the work that we have done is based upon opportunities to ask questions and we have on this with resources that were available at little or no cost.
Our belief is that funds should be more available for course evaluations and that development of better assessment tools should be encouraged.
We also learned about individual learning behavior and in retrospect could identify students with learning problems. We plan to be more responsive to this in the future.
