Keynote: Assessing Assessment in Physics
Peter Main, Professor Emeritus, King’s College London
I have undertaken a critical review of the types of assessment that take place in UK physics degrees, starting with the purposes and principles of assessment and analysing how well they correlate with practice. I argue that there are tensions within the system which lead to perverse outcomes, such as the recent rapid grade inflation, and which are shifting the emphasis away from students obtaining the best education towards obtaining the best qualification. I identify several emergent issues in physics assessment, although many of them apply across a range of subjects. Some of the issues can only be addressed at an institutional or national level but others can be addressed within the departments. However, all the solutions require us to take a step backwards to take a long, hard, honest look at our current assessments. I shall try to indicate how we might begin to do that.
Physics Students attitudes to Academic Integrity
Helen Heath, University of Bristol
The move to online examinations brought the topic of academic integrity to the fore in many science subjects, where previously invigilated examinations had made cheating difficult. We may be returning to “normal” but students still have course work assignments. I will present some data on students’ attitudes to academic integrity collected in a large 1st year class at the start of the academic year 21/22. This study gives some insight into when it is considered “OK” not to stick to the rules and attitudes to other students’ misconduct.
Maintaining a sense of belonging amidst all the disruption
Alison Voice, University of Leeds (and co presenters Nic Labrosse, University of Glasgow and Helen Heath, University of Bristol)
A sense of belonging is crucial for student retention and success. A longitudinal study of first-year physics students at three UK universities was undertaken pre-covid (2019-20) and during the height of the pandemic (2022-21) to understand how students transition to university and engage with their learning community. This has given a voice to students in diverse situations, and an understanding of the impact of induction activities, teaching methods, and the disruption faced in secondary school, on their sense of belonging, engagement, and academic success. This session will provide information to anticipate which students may feel more vulnerable, and suggest methods to mitigate.
What does a physics student need to do to succeed? Understanding staff and student attitudes in physics
Amy Smith, Imperial College London
Research shows that pervasive stereotypes about physics act as a barrier to belonging for underrepresented groups, yet social norms within the context of studying physics, which have the power to influence behavioural decisions, are under-researched. This study investigated longitudinal shifts in, and differences between, student and staff attitudes, as well as normative beliefs towards skills and behaviours in an undergraduate physics course at a research-intensive university in the UK. Questionnaires were used with first year undergraduate students at the beginning and end of their first year of study, and with staff at the beginning of the academic year. Additional in-person focus groups were conducted with a subset of students to probe subjective normative beliefs and their influence on behaviour and authenticity. This study presents two main findings. Firstly, students and staff placed transferrable social skills such as “cross-cultural awareness” and the “ability to contribute to discussions” as less valuable for a physics student than discipline-based skills such as “problem-solving”. This may suggest that students and staff value the skills which contribute to success in traditional assessment methods, such as individual written exams, as opposed to the skills beneficial in group-based assessments. Secondly, this study found a mismatch between staff expectations of alignment of staff and student attitudes, and the actual alignment. Staff expected first-year students to have markedly different values to staff, but for the difference to reduce as students progressed through the course, expecting fourth years to be more aligned with the staff view. This was particularly the case on the item “being intelligent/clever” which staff expected students would value more highly than themselves. However, the values of students and staff were mostly in agreement. This could suggest that staff believe university is not only a place for gaining knowledge, but also for evolving attitudes.
Why did you stop studying physics?
Peter H Sneddon, University of Glasgow
When students apply to study Physics at the University of Glasgow, they are admitted to the College of Science & Engineering. They are not locked into their original degree choice, though, and most study three different disciplines in their first year. In any given year a small number – typically around 10 – elect to leave the subject at the end first year for another degree. There are normally 170-180 students setting out on a physics-related degree each year. Whilst this does not represent a significant loss in numbers, and indeed the College structure is designed to allow such changes, it was felt important that we properly understood what motivated these students to make this decision. The investigation consisted of remote interviews with 5 students and follow up emails. Influencing factors identified from the literature were explored. [Course content and performance (Thompson and Pyper, 2006; Baker et al, 2018), staff (Jaradat, 2017), peers (Pu et al, 2020) , salary and jobs ((Baker et al, 2018) and gender stereotypes (Meyer and Straub, 2019)] It was found that course content, peers and salary & job opportunities were all influential factors for the students. Staff and traditional gender stereotypes were not influential factors. Whilst this work was carried out specifically in physics, the key motivators for change may exist for students in all degree paths. Understanding these better will allow Higher Education educators (in physics or chemistry) to improve our teaching and advising provisions to ensure that no-one is unnecessarily lost from a particular path.
REFERENCES:
Baker, R., Bettinger, E., Jacob, B., Marinescu, I. (2018) The Effect of Labor Market Information on Community College Students’ Major Choice, Economics of Education Review, 65, 18-30, ISSN 0272-7757, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econedurev.2018.05.005.
Jaradat, M.S. (2017) Reasons Influence Students’ Decisions to Change College Majors International Journal of Humanities and Social Science, 7(3), p233-238 http://www.ijhssnet.com/journal/index/3777
Meyer, J. , Straub, S. (2019) The influence of gender composition in a field of study on students’ drop-out of higher education. European Journal of Education. 54(3); p443 – 456. https://doi.org/10.1111/ejed.12357
Pu, S., Yan, Y. and Zhang, L. (2021) Do Peers Affect Undergraduates’ Decisions to Switch Majors? Educational Researcher, 50(8) https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X211023514
Thompson, S., Pyper, B. (2006) Why are you in Physics, Anyway? American Physical Society, Four Corners Section of the APS Fall Meeting https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2006APS..4CF.D4004T/abstract
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