The Essentials of Assessment Validation: Guide to Validating Assessments

Post-registration, RTOs are tasked with many responsibilities including annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, and marketing compliance, and validation is often the most challenging.

Although our articles cover validation extensively, let’s redefine it. According to ASQA, validation is a quality review of the assessment process.

Essentially, validation is about identifying which parts of an RTO's assessment process are effective and which need improvement. With a proper grasp of its key aspects, validation becomes less daunting.

The SRTOs 2015 Clause 1.8 specifies that RTOs need to ensure compliance of their assessment systems, including RPL, with training package requirements, following the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

According to the standards, two types of validation are necessary.

The first validation type ensures your RTO's assessments comply with the training package requirements in your scope.

The second validation type ensures that assessments adhere to the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.

This indicates validation occurs before and after the assessment process. We will focus on the first type: assessment tool validation.

An Overview of the Two Types of Assessment Validation

The Fundamentals of Assessment Validation

As noted earlier and in our earlier blogs, validation is divided into two stages: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.

Assessment tool validation, often referred to as pre-assessment validation or verification, deals with ensuring all unit requirements are addressed as per the first part of the clause, ensuring complete workbook compliance.

Conversely, post-assessment validation focuses on the implementation side, ensuring Registered Training Organisations conduct assessments in line with the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

Here, we will concentrate on assessment tool validation.

How to Properly Conduct Assessment Tool Validation

Having reviewed the two types of validation, let’s dive into the specifics of assessment tool validation.

When to Conduct Assessment Tool Validation

Assessment tool validation aims to verify that all elements, performance criteria, and performance and knowledge evidence are covered by your assessment tools.

Hence, whenever new learning resources are bought, assessment tool validation is necessary before student use.

There's no requirement to wait for the next validation schedule in your 5-year cycle. Validate new resources promptly to ensure they’re appropriate for students.

Yet, this is not the only occasion to conduct this type of validation. Perform assessment tool validation when you:

- resources are updated by you
- you add new training products on scope
- when course is reviewed against training product updates
- learning resources are identified as a risk during the risk assessment

ASQA applies a risk-based approach to regulate RTOs, expecting regular risk assessments. Hence, student complaints about learning resources are a good opportunity for assessment tool validation.

Training Products to Validate

Bear in mind, this validation aims to ensure compliance of all learning resources before use. All RTOs are required to validate all unit resources.

Starting Assessment Tool Validation: What You Need

Course Materials

Given that you are conducting assessment tool validation, you will need the full array of your learning resources:

Mapping tool – the initial document to investigate. It identifies which assessment items address unit requirements, helping speed up validation.

Learner/student workbook – assess its appropriateness for use as an assessment tool. Verify clear instructions and adequate answer fields. This is often a gap.

Assessor guide/marking guide – confirm that instructions for assessors are adequate and clear benchmarks for each assessment item are present. Clear benchmarks are crucial for reliable assessment outcomes.

Other related resources – might include checklists, registers, and templates developed independently from the workbook and marking guide. Validate them to confirm they fit the assessment task and address unit requirements.

Validation Board

Clause 1.11 outlines the criteria for validation panel members, specifying that validation can be done by one or more people. RTOs typically require all trainers and assessors to participate, occasionally inviting industry experts.

Your validation panel, as a group, must possess:

Relevant vocational competencies and industry skills for the unit being validated

Up-to-date knowledge and skills in vocational teaching and learning

Any one of the following training and assessment credentials:

TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or an updated successor

Assessment validation tool/template
Having a validation tool helps you with both the validation process and documentation. Using a validation tool makes it easier to look at how each assessment item maps against each unit requirement.
Using a validation tool helps in both the validation process and documentation. It facilitates seeing how each assessment item matches each unit requirement.
At the same time, it can serve as your document evidence that you have validated your resources before letting the students use them.
It also acts as evidence that you have validated your resources prior to student use.

ASQA does not specify a recommended or required template for assessment tool validation, but many templates are accessible online. These tools usually have validators review the tools in their entirety to ensure they meet the principles of assessment.

Assessment Principles Template Yes/No/Partially Comments
1. Fair
2. Flexible
3. Valid
4. Reliable

Though these templates simplify validation, they can lead to judgment errors due to limited space for comments on each assessment item.

It is highly advisable to use a more detailed template for evaluating each unit requirement and its corresponding assessment items. Below is an example:

Element Performance Criteria Assessment Guidelines Standards Assessment Instrument Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What Needs Inspection?

As noted in our blog post Common Problems In Assessment Tools, your assessment tools must ensure trainers follow assessment principles and evidence rules.

Assessment Principles
Fairness – Are equal opportunity and access ensured for everyone in the assessment process?

Flexibility – Does the assessment offer various ways to demonstrate competence according to different needs and preferences?

Validity – Does the assessment assess what it is intended to assess? Is it a valid tool for measuring the required skill or knowledge?

Reliability – Will the assessment produce the same results every time, regardless of who conducts the training? Will different How to validate assessment tools Australia assessors consistently decide on skill competence?

Evidence Key Rules

Validity – Does the evidence indicate that the candidate possesses the skills, knowledge, and attributes described in the unit of competency and associated assessment requirements?
Sufficiency – Is there enough evidence to ensure that the learner has the skills and knowledge required?
Sufficiency – Is the evidence enough to confirm the learner has the required skills and knowledge?

Authenticity – Is the assessment tool verifying that the work is the candidate’s own?

Currency – Are the assessment tools reflective of current units of competency and contemporary industry practices?

Despite being frequently covered in VET professional development and nationally recognised training, many tools still have issues with these requirements.

To prevent using learning resources that do not meet some unit requirements, make sure to follow these guidelines:

Practice Your Teachings

Pay close attention to the verbs in the unit requirements and ensure they are addressed by the assessment item. For instance, in the unit CHCECE032 Nurture babies and toddlers, one performance evidence requirement requires students to:

Carry out each of the following at least once with two different babies under 12 months old in a safe environment, using age-appropriate verbal and non-verbal communication as per service and regulatory requirements:

nappying

prepare bottles, bottle-feed babies and sanitize equipment

prepare solids and feed babies

appropriately respond to infant signs and cues

prepare and settle infants for rest

monitor and foster physical exploration and gross motor skills appropriate for the age

Getting students to describe changing nappies for babies under 12 months doesn’t meet the unit requirement. Unless the requirement assesses underpinning knowledge (i.e., knowledge evidence), students should be performing the tasks.

Pay Attention to Plurals!
Pay attention to the numbers. In our example on one of the unit requirements of CHCECE032, this single unit requirement calls for the students to complete the tasks at least once on two different babies under 12 months of age. Having students complete the tasks listed twice on just 1 baby won’t cut it.
Mind the numbers. In our CHCECE032 example, one unit requirement requires students to complete the tasks at least once with two different babies under 12 months old. Doing the tasks twice with one baby isn’t sufficient.

All or Not Competent

Pay attention to lists. Again, as illustrated above, if students perform just half the tasks listed, it’s non-compliant. Each assessment item must address all requirements, or the student is not yet competent and the assessment tool is non-compliant.
Can you be more specific?
Be More Specific

Each assessment item must include clear and specific benchmark answers to guide the assessor’s judgment on the student’s competence. Hence, ensure your instructions are clear and not confusing for students or assessors. For instance:
What kind of information can be included in a work package?
What kind of information can be included in a work package?

Possible answers include:

Necessary materials

Associated expenses

Time assigned for activities

Assigned functions and responsibilities

When an assessment item calls for several answers, indicate the number of answers required from a student. This way, your assessment remains reliable, and the evidence collected is valid.

The same applies to assessment items with double-barrelled questions or those requiring multiple answers simultaneously. These can confuse students and assessors, as demonstrated in the sample question below:

Identify a hazard and/or environmental issue in the workplace and select the most effective hazard control hierarchy.

Possible answers may include, but are not limited to:

Weather conditions – work area isolation, engineering controls, PPE

Work area and ground conditions – elimination, isolation, engineering

People – isolating, use of engineering controls, administrative controls

Structural hazards – substitution, isolating, engineering controls

Chemical hazards – isolating, engineering, administration

Equipment or machinery – isolating, use of engineering controls, administrative controls

Avoiding double-barrelled questions makes it simpler for students to respond and for assessors to accurately judge competence.

Seeing these requirements, you might wonder, “Don’t learning resource developers provide audit guarantees?” However, these guarantees mean you must wait for an audit to rectify noncompliance. This affects your compliance history, so it’s wiser to take a safe and compliant approach.