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Access arrangements are pre-exam arrangements that aim to remove any barriers that might prevent students with specific needs from accessing the assessment and demonstrating their knowledge and skills. Access arrangements are not intended to change the assessment demand or reduce its validity. Using a survey questionnaire, the present study reports on the views of 258 centres in eight countries around the world regarding teachers' and students' perceptions of access arrangements. The questionnaire included a mixture of closed and open-ended questions covering the following themes: awareness and provision of access arrangements; resources to provide access arrangements; views on access arrangements (including their usefulness, fairness, and perceived effectiveness of use); and overall views on access and inclusion.

Errors that occasionally manifest in examination papers and other educational assessment instruments can threaten reliability and validity. For example, a multiple choice question could have two correct response options, or a geography question containing an inaccurate map could be unanswerable. In this paper we explore this oft-neglected element of fairness. We adopt the theoretical position that assessment instrument errors stem from different types of human failure, which in turn stem from system-level failure. We then explore how the term 'error' is used in conceptually different ways, potentially engendering confusion in academic discourse. We analysed error incident records from an international assessment organisation to develop a taxonomy of assessment instrument error types. Our taxonomy covers errors that manifest in assessments in all school subjects. We used it to develop an approach to process analysis for any system of checks applied during the later stages of instrument construction. This facilitates subsequent evaluation of the psychological causes of failure. The taxonomy and process analysis approach have applications in analysing types and rates of errors in different educational assessment instruments, in systemically comparing the demands and efficacies of alternative construction processes, and as structural and communication tools in qualitative research on error culture.

As part of continued efforts to ensure inclusivity in assessment, OCR has developed a set of accessibility principles for question design in GCSE Science examinations, which has been applied since 2018. The principles are intended to help ensure that all students can demonstrate their knowledge, understanding and skills to the best of their ability. The aim of this research was to consider the effectiveness of the accessibility principles by investigating students' perceptions of question features in terms of accessibility. Two versions of a short test were constructed using questions with and without the accessibility principles applied. Students in Year 11 (aged 15 to 16 years old) from four schools across England attempted the test and, of these, 57 were interviewed afterwards. Students were asked about question design features relating to the different accessibility principles and encouraged to talk about how accessible they felt the questions were and why. The results revealed that for most of the question features explored in this study, students' perceptions of accessibility tended to align with expected effects. However, for three accessibility themes, the findings were neutral or mixed.

There has been controversy around the practice of providing accommodations, with some suggesting that they may give an unfair advantage rather than level the playing field. If that were the case, the assessment results of students with accommodations could be inflated, leading to a detrimental effect on the assessment's validity. This research investigated this claim by comparing the performance of students who completed high-stakes examinations with and without test accommodations. To account for group differences that could affect performance, students were matched on background characteristics. The results revealed that students with accommodations performed similarly to or slightly worse than students without accommodations, suggesting that, in most cases, the accommodations worked as intended and helped levelling the playing field.

Errors that occasionally manifest in examination papers and other educational assessment instruments can threaten reliability and validity. For example, a multiple choice question could have two correct response options, or a geography question containing an inaccurate map could be unanswerable. In this paper we explore this oft-neglected element of fairness. We adopt the theoretical position that assessment instrument errors stem from different types of human failure, which in turn stem from system-level failure. We then explore how the term 'error' is used in conceptually different ways, potentially engendering confusion in academic discourse. We analysed error incident records from an international assessment organisation to develop a taxonomy of assessment instrument error types. Our taxonomy covers errors that manifest in assessments in all school subjects. We used it to develop an approach to process analysis for any system of checks applied during the later stages of instrument construction. This facilitates subsequent evaluation of the psychological causes of failure. The taxonomy and process analysis approach have applications in analysing types and rates of errors in different educational assessment instruments, in systemically comparing the demands and efficacies of alternative construction processes, and as structural and communication tools in qualitative research on error culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]