” Compassion means the noticing of social or physical distress to others and the commitment to reduce or prevent that distress”. Gilbert 2017:189
How can we make our assessment and feedback practices more compassionate?
The online, cross-programme event, Wednesday 15 February, 2-4pm, was led by Dr Neil Currant, it explored the affective aspects of assessment practices and the impact they have on students. The intention of the session was to reimagine assessment practices for a social justice oriented, relational and compassionate approach. As someone from a traditional authoritative educational background, I was keen to explore further.
There seems to be a common misconception that addressing the need for support in feedback makes it in some way soft, easy or a compromise. Not at all, it was simply about avoiding distress. Dr Currant further stated that “Compassionate assessment and feedback must be underpinned by equality not equity”. It began me reflecting on what is compassion. For me there must be an honesty, but with that truth there must be support.
‘Students talked about challenges about consistency of the feedback between tutors and across their courses and many of them felt it wasn’t sufficiently personalised and some students felt it wasn’t sufficiently challenging to enable them to actually attain as high as they might be able to. They wanted much more personalised guidance to allow them to attain high. And I think that links with other issues which have emerged in research around having high expectations of all of our students.’
(Liz Thomas 2022 UAL AwardingGap Review)
We began exploring compassion with each other as a cohort. Compassion does not mean giving only positive feedback. ‘Be precise, avoid tentative wording. Be attentive to the fact that the words we use might affect student identities. Beware of the first person, feedback is about the student’s work, not the feedback giver. Avoid adverbs and superlatives (e.g. unfortunately). Don’t judge the work, evaluate. Speak similarly to a student awarded higher grades as to those getting lower grades’.
Reflecting, it made me think about how honest can a tutor write, in relation to care for a student. When I first started teaching I was told never to discourage a student from leaving the course. Where does honesty and care exist within constraint? Was this a compassionate or commercially imposed constraint.
“Compassionate feedback requires a willingness to be vulnerable and to acknowledge our own limitations and biases. It requires us to recognise the unique needs and experiences of each individual and to respond with sensitivity and compassion.”
D’Olimpio, L. (2019) ‘Ethics Explainer: Ethics of Care’, The Ethics Centre [Online], 16 May. Available at: https://ethics.org.au/ethics-explainer-ethics-of-care/ (Accessed: 15 November 2022).
UAL hosts information about what is essential ‘Assessment Criteria’ shown above, it does not mention how it should be viewed. Could it be expanded to highlight empathy and open mindedness, in order to create a safe and supportive environment for our students. Recognising our own faults or past failings in order to do so and instil change?