Coordinating change: introducing pluralism in the assessment of a humanities module for improved engagement and attainment of first year architecture students

摘要

This paper reports on the process of diversifying assessment of the ‘History and Theory of Architecture and Design’ module at Level 1 in the undergraduate Architecture course at the University of Lincoln, UK. Replacing essays (the traditional form of assessment for theoretical subjects in our school) with other types of assignments was a strategic response to the mixture of academic ability shown in the last decade by first year students; amongst other things, this variety of knowledge and skills is a reflection of the liberalisation of Higher Education in the UK, which increased the diversity of student backgrounds along with the internationalisation of the course (RIBA 2012:7). In addition, statistically (James 2003), creative courses attract a higher incidence of dyslexia than other subjects. In this context, written assignments represented a deficit model of assessment, the solution being to make assessments less dependent on language and the module more immersive and participatory than traditional theoretical subjects, with assignments becoming episodes of active learning. The change in assessment was also seen as an opportunity to re-orient theoretical submissions to become more relevant to practice in architecture. This paper details the reasons and scope of the modifications, describes methods used, within the constraints currently placed on Higher Education in general and Schools of Architecture in particular, and comments on the consequences of these changes for students and academics, from the author’s point of view, as module coordinator.