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Examiners ‘assessment criteria in dissertations and the learning outcomes of doctoral education

Ahlberg, Anders LU (2016) p.29-29
Abstract
Swedish dissertations are public, followed by closed
assessment committee meetings that only report pass-fail
votes. 166 external examiners from 72 doctoral dissertations
were therefore anonymously surveyed for their views on passfail norms, scientific standard of theses and candidates and the
academic independence of the assessed candidate. They were
also asked to relate their assessment to the national learning
outcomes for the PhD degree.
Scientific standard and academic independence were with
few exceptions considered sufficiently strong to very strong.
However, pass-fail norm statements varied strongly in quality
from 1) qualitative demands on student performance, 2)
demands on research... (More)
Swedish dissertations are public, followed by closed
assessment committee meetings that only report pass-fail
votes. 166 external examiners from 72 doctoral dissertations
were therefore anonymously surveyed for their views on passfail norms, scientific standard of theses and candidates and the
academic independence of the assessed candidate. They were
also asked to relate their assessment to the national learning
outcomes for the PhD degree.
Scientific standard and academic independence were with
few exceptions considered sufficiently strong to very strong.
However, pass-fail norm statements varied strongly in quality
from 1) qualitative demands on student performance, 2)
demands on research output, 3) tautological statements, to 4)
expectations of emotional responses among the assessors. This
is much in line with Lovitts (2007) who investigated examiners
norms in a range of academic disciplines. The paper raises the
discussion whether examiners statements reflect how they think
during dissertations, or, if dissertation assessment includes tacit
norms hard to explicitly describe. The study further reveals a
variation in ‘visibility’ of the various required national learning
outcomes in the dissertation assessment meetings. This
underlines the need for an improved PhD assessment process
where some PhD competencies are assessed separate from the
dissertation. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to conference
publication status
published
subject
categories
Higher Education
pages
30 pages
language
English
LU publication?
yes
additional info
Quality in Post-graduate Rersearch (QPR) Conference Proceedings 2016
id
c4bb0358-41e5-48d2-bd32-86c51c909992
alternative location
http://www.qpr.edu.au/Proceedings/QPR_Proceedings_2016.pdf
date added to LUP
2019-03-19 16:33:19
date last changed
2019-04-24 11:14:08
@misc{c4bb0358-41e5-48d2-bd32-86c51c909992,
  abstract     = {{Swedish dissertations are public, followed by closed<br/>assessment committee meetings that only report pass-fail<br/>votes. 166 external examiners from 72 doctoral dissertations<br/>were therefore anonymously surveyed for their views on passfail norms, scientific standard of theses and candidates and the<br/>academic independence of the assessed candidate. They were<br/>also asked to relate their assessment to the national learning<br/>outcomes for the PhD degree.<br/>Scientific standard and academic independence were with<br/>few exceptions considered sufficiently strong to very strong.<br/>However, pass-fail norm statements varied strongly in quality<br/>from 1) qualitative demands on student performance, 2)<br/>demands on research output, 3) tautological statements, to 4)<br/>expectations of emotional responses among the assessors. This<br/>is much in line with Lovitts (2007) who investigated examiners<br/>norms in a range of academic disciplines. The paper raises the<br/>discussion whether examiners statements reflect how they think<br/>during dissertations, or, if dissertation assessment includes tacit<br/>norms hard to explicitly describe. The study further reveals a<br/>variation in ‘visibility’ of the various required national learning<br/>outcomes in the dissertation assessment meetings. This<br/>underlines the need for an improved PhD assessment process<br/>where some PhD competencies are assessed separate from the<br/>dissertation.}},
  author       = {{Ahlberg, Anders}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{04}},
  pages        = {{29--29}},
  title        = {{Examiners ‘assessment criteria in dissertations and the learning outcomes of doctoral education}},
  url          = {{http://www.qpr.edu.au/Proceedings/QPR_Proceedings_2016.pdf}},
  year         = {{2016}},
}