Advancing assessment in co-design with students - an evidence informed approach to enhancing practice: paper presentation at conference

<br/>Students’ views are shifting in how they want to engage in higher education, driven by complex socio-economic landscapes they are operating within (Hughes 2023). This has prompted higher education institutes (HEIs) to re-consider how they support students with diverse ranges of needs and wellbeing issues (Firth et al 2023). Central to this is their experience of assessment and feedback which remains as a point of weakness in their overall university experience. Therefore, it is imperative that HEIs hear their voices around learning development and assessment journeys, especially given the other demands on their time (Neves et al 2024) and work in co-design to build connectiveness (McIntosh and May 2025).<br/>The University of Southampton has developed a 5 year Advancing Assessment Project to enhance assessment thinking and embrace new ideas across the institution, with a set of principles with inclusivity and accessibility at the core. This has included the introduction of an Assessment Consultancy, providing bespoke individual and whole programme development with a core ethos of student co-design. It also supports the Southampton Transformative Assessment Redesign with Students (STARS) programme providing an evidential base to support enhancements (CHEP 2025). <br/>This session will present recent findings from the project and relay initial evaluations of the approaches, including discussing the challenges and impacts that the project has enabled. The session aims to inform learning development peers and enable learning from our own and others experience who may already be on this journey. The session will encourage rich discourse around approaches to enhance learning development of assessment and feedback practices to ensure inclusive and accessible approaches at the outset. It will consider how HEIs should build the foundations for assessment and feedback innovations to align with emerging trends in assessment and feedback including optionality of assessment and cohesive programme development design (Walker 2025). <br/><br/>