Autumn Symposium 24 Review

Our inaugural symposium, led by Vicky Merrick and Merrick Education, took place yesterday. Hosted by our partners at AWS at their London HQ, the event attracted over 100 curriculum and assessment leaders from around the UK and beyond.

Morning

It's hard to summarise all of the ideas and views that came out of these high quality presentations. For me however there was a general sense of the time being right to 're-claim assessment' after a period where it was seen by practitioners as a burden rather than a 'super-power' to enhance learning and outcomes.

Valerie Singer gave a global perspective about the tremendous change and opportunity happening all around the world. Alice Whitby provided an inspirational call to action from all present to re-establish Assessment as the 'bridge' between curriculum and pedagogy.

Dr. Simon Child focused on the need to raise assessment literacy throughout the teaching workforce and the potential this can deliver impact from learners. The morning ended with Daniel Emmerson presenting from Hong Kong with some learned lessons about the potential opportunities and threats of an AI future.

Afternoon

The afternoon started with an inspirational presentation from the team at the Dance Adjudication Network who spoke about the journey they had been on to assess breaking over many years culminating with comparative judgement being used at the Paris Olympics. They spoke passionately about the need to focus on the values that matter and not to bend to traditional orthodoxys.

"Why don't you use scores?"

"Because scores don't work here!"

The second part of this session was handed over to practioners from 3 of the largest Multi-Academy Trusts in the UK. Dale Bassett (United Learning), Amie Barr (Ark) and Pete Davies (E-Act) provided their individual perspectives. It was interesting to see how they were the 'same but different', and how all were at still very much 'work in progress'.

Final session

Fittingly this part of the day started with a panel discussion led by Mary Myatt. Mary has un-paralleled experience and was able to offer a clear summary of her own learnings from the day. It was heartening to hear her view that the case for Comparative Judgement as part of the assessment puzzle if unquestionable - "it's time has come".

The final session of the day gave host Vicky Merrick the opportunity to summarise the learnings from the day. The main one perhaps was a call to action - there is important work to be done and there is no time to lose.

The day ended with networking drinks from our AWS partner manager Namrata Das. The discussions continued long after the event ended - always a good sign.

What next?

Events are an important part of our mission - expect to see more!