Top British universities are set to offer “inclusive assessments” for minority groups to yield better results.
The Office for Students (OfS) has approved plans proposed by Russell Group universities to replace in-person, unseen exams with open-book tests and take-home papers popularised during the pandemic.
Institutions are being encouraged to close the attainment gap between the number of Firsts and 2:1s awarded to white, middle-class students compared with other groups, the Daily Mail reports.
Traditional exams are seen to put ethnic minorities, poorer groups, and those with mental health issues and disabilities at a disadvantage.
The Access and Participation Plans (APPs) have been approved by the OfS.
Universities must ring up a list of ways they have been supporting their students from disadvantaged backgrounds in order to keep on the regulator’s register each year.
The University of Oxford’s proposals are to “use a more diverse and inclusive range of assessments” to “improve the likelihood” of those from “lower socio-economic backgrounds” obtaining quality degrees.
More explicitly, pledges by Cambridge include “’improving outcomes” for “Black-British and British-Bangladeshi students” and mentions that “assessment practices” might be the root cause for “awarding gaps”.
However, King’s College London has set out plans to “diversify assessment” to make the process “fairer” while keeping some semblance of traditional exams.
Currently, data from the regulatory body revealed a 22 per cent difference between white and black students achieving 2:1s, while there is an 11 per cent between advantaged and disadvantaged students.
A spokesman for the OfS said: “Through APPs, we encourage universities to consider whether their assessments are working properly for all students because we know that some students are more likely to attain lower grades than their peers, even when their prior academic performance is the same.
“Where there is evidence that current assessment models may not be fair, it is appropriate for universities to trial and evaluate changes in the way they grade students.”
However, he maintained that programmes must continue to be “academically robust, credible, and a reliable reflection of students’ hard work”.