Reliability

Thursday, 20 October 2011 15:51

The ongoing debate about the reliability and validity of national tests, public examinations and other qualifications in England prompted Ofqual to launch its Reliability Programme - a ‘health check‘ on the reliability of qualification, examination and test results – in May 2008. The programme was launched in order to gather evidence to develop regulatory policy on reliability with a view to improving the assessment systems further. “Reliability” in the technical context means how consistent the results of qualifications and assessments would be if the assessment procedure was replicated – in other words, satisfying questions such as whether a student would have received the same result if he or she happened to take a different version of the exam, took the test on a different day, or if a different examiner had marked the paper.

The programme marked the first major exploration into this area by a regulator. Research on the programme conducted by teams and individuals from both the UK and abroad focussed on generating evidence of the reliability of results, interpreting and communicating reliability evidence, and the public’s perceptions of reliability.

All the research undertaken by assessment experts as part of this programme have now been published for the first time in a compendium. To make the findings from the programme to be accessible to non-technical audience, the compendium also features a short introduction to each of the reports written using plain English. The research will also be published in a hard copy book later this year as a useful resource for use by researchers and awarding organisations. Although Ofqual’s reliability programme came to a close in summer 2011, work on reliability and validity will continue in 2012.

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Other reports that do not form part of our Reliability Compendium can be found under 'other reliability reports' to the right of this page.

Last Updated on Friday, 27 January 2012 11:50 Tags: Ofqual, education, examination regulation, qualifications, assessments