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This paper relates two basic aspects of assessment evaluation in higher education (Formative Assessment and Competency Assessment) with the existence of an Inter-University Network that carries five years working these issues systematically. First, we analyze the state of the Formative and Shared Assessment in Higher Education. Second, we explain the organization and operation of the Network of Formative Assessment in Higher Education: purpose, basic methodology of work, different actions and framework: innovation projects and educational research, seminars, action-research, dissemination of results, annual conferences and thematic work-groups. We also present the main results, organized into four sections: a-advantages; b-cons, problems and possible solutions; c-influence on academic performance; d-load of work required by teachers and pupils. In the third and final section of the paper we explain the fundamental aspects of Competency Assessment in Higher Education, the changes required and the importance of coherence among curriculum elements, in this sense, we provide a practical application that we hope will be helpful in achieving higher level of coherence in our curriculum subjects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is focused on the selfassessment trough e-rubrics. Rubrics as an instrument of self-assessment involve a process of reflection that can contribute to increase the involvement and awareness of their own achievements. Here we wanted to engage students from the design and creation of rubric through a collaborative process of building an e-rubric by the students and the teacher. In this study, undergraduate students of Pedagogy participated in an elective subject in their third year. It was developed in several stages in a semester: training for using e-rubrics, designing and construction of e-rubrics, using the e-rubric as a tool for self-assessment and filling a final questionnaire to collect their views. It's important to consider that when we work with innovative strategies of assessment, students have to know not only the features of the instrument but also they have to know the influence to improve their learning processes and they have to achieve the ability to incorporate it to their own skills as education professionals. As main result, students highlighted the importance of rubrics to guide their learning processes and to reflect about it and the capacity of rubric to predict their performance in the subject. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we show the most relevant results of the first year of implementation of the Educational Evaluation National Network and University Teaching. The basic methodology used was action-research on formative assessment practices in higher education, in subjects taught by teachers members of the net, with a total of 41 cases. The results present the advantages that this assessment system meant both for students and for teachers involved, including the greater involvement and motivation of students, as well as further development of students' autonomy. Some difficulties were also detected, such as excess work for the teachers or the lack of habit of students in formative assessment processes. The project we have developed has a direct effect on the university teaching practice and lead us to consider the formative evaluation as an essential element to renew our teaching practice and as a good alternative for dealing with the changes arising from the European Higher Education Area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In April 2008, the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) approved the document Marc per al disseny i la implantació dels plans d'estudis de grau (Framework for the Design and Implementation of Undergraduate Curricula), which establishes a set of methodological and assessment guidelines that should be taken on board in current university teaching. It also stipulates the introduction of seven generic competencies in all undergraduate degrees and explores how they might be incorporated into degree curricula to guarantee that students acquire them. Four of these generic competencies (self-directed learning, team work, effective use of information resources, and oral and written communication) are transferrable across degree courses, two (entrepreneurship and innovation, and sustainability and social commitment) are hallmarks of the UPC and the last (foreign language) is established by law. In this paper, we aim to shed light on an experience that brings together various support initiatives that may be of use to other universities wishing to provide their teaching staff and management teams with guidelines, policy frameworks and tools for the integration, development and assessment of competencies in a way that is consistent with their teaching models and with the European Higher Education Area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we present the results arising from a project to the preparation and testing of a multimedia material to promoting autonomous learning in the acquisition of specific competences of the Ecology practices course, in Biology studies at the Universitat de les Illes Balears (UIB). The main objective lies in the gradual adaptation to the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) from greater coordination among teachers and the acquisition of new resources for teaching. The results obtained in the materials experimentation can be considered significantly positive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The experience we analyse in this paper affects the staff who imparted teaching during the years 2007-2008, 2008-2009 and 2009-2010 in the second years of the common degree both in Social Education and Social Work. A series of general and specific competences have been planned by every teacher referred to every subject they give from a common basis. Group work-workshops-has been the frame from which that co-operation started towards the design of this pionneer experience of adaptation to the European Space. The achievement of the objectives has taken three years of common work during which the arising problems have been solved by putting into practice this experience being of great importance the design of a system of evaluation in competences in order to reach the pursued aims. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Higher Education Area (EHEA) laid the foundations for a model of competency-based training. In this sense, there are several proposals suggest working on the ability for teamworking in activities developing the content of one or several subjects. However, they aren't so common in assessment tasks. This paper contains an application of Teams-Games-Tournament (DeVries and Edwards, 1973) to carry out the assessment of a subject. Teams-Games-Tournament is an alternative to traditional assessment tests based not on individual assessment, but on the development and group collaboration to achieve common goals. The implications, advantages and disadvantages of the application of this technique are discussed in the framework of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a general discussion on competence-based assessment applied to Final Year Project Work (for short, TFG) is presented and, particularly, on generic competences concerning bachelor degrees at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB). First we provide the results of a study carried out on the type and number of generic competences that have been chosen as evaluable for bachelor degrees at the UAB. Some differences are observed regarding the field of knowledge of each one. Secondly, the results of a proposal of indicators of the same generic competences in various fields of knowledge are described. While a similar sequence of indicators can be established in any case, the starting point of the assessment of the competence, as well as the time in which each indicator is assessed, varies among different fields of knowledge. These results suggest that the field of knowledge is actually a factor to consider in designing competence-based assessment, even when considering only the generic competences, which by definition are common to all disciplines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents some findings of an evaluation study conducted in five spanish universities on the design of a 'FORCOM Guides for Self-Assessment Teaching Competencies'. This device has been developed to help university teachers to cope with the teaching demands of EHEA. Data collected in a previous teaching needs? assessment were the grounds of the very first design of the guide. Sixteen senior university teachers - of any scientific area- had been demanded, firstly, implementing the Guide, and next, they had been required in order to look for their perceptions about: a) the ease and other aspects of practical management of the Guides ('format evaluation'), and b) the utility and suitability of its content to teachers? teaching needs ('content evaluation'). Data analysis points to: 1) the validity and utility of the created device, especially for helping well experienced teachers in EHEA; 2) its capability the increase the teaching technical knowledge of the teacher, and 3) some change demands related with the present format and with the content of the Guides, as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]