THE QUEST FOR AUTHENTIC ASSESSMENT IN THE AGE OF AI
John Taylor argues that the thinking required to plan a successful school project not only lends itself to authentic assessment, but may also be one of the key skills for students to acquire for the coming era of generative AI.
Assessment and the challenge of AI
At a recent conference about the future of assessment (Next Generation Assessment, 2026) the challenge of AI inevitably arose. Following a discussion about how the Extended Project Qualification (‘EPQ’) and similar project-based qualifications are having a significant impact in promoting learning that is not dependent upon the restrictions of a traditional written exam and associated mark scheme, it was suggested that AI, in effect, was closing the door on coursework as a valid mode of assessment. It’s an objection that is becoming familiar: does the emergence of readily available systems that can mimic the work of students with such precision as to be undetectable mean that the days of coursework and ‘projects’ are numbered?
Quite the reverse. I venture to suggest that AI does indeed pose a challenge, but not simply to project-based assessment models as there is already a degree of artificiality in many written exams, in which there is a risk of formulaic responses to predictable questions leading to a loss of assessment validity.
And if AI is indeed a challenge to assessment that is both valid and reliable, how can we best act to meet it?
Authentic assessment
The best response to AI would be to establish an authentic mode of assessment. In fact, it is in precisely this domain that projects come into their own. When a student selects for themself a question that is personally engaging and linked to a real-world challenge, the risk of outsourcing the intellectual labour to generative AI is far less.
Moreover, if, as is the case with project qualifications, we build in such safeguards as mentor checks on the project process, learner records of evolving thought processes and a synoptic presentation in which the learner defends their work and explicates the creative journey that led up to it, we have all the materials we need for an assessment model that is both AI-resilient and also future-facing, being adaptable, multi-modal and learner-responsive.
The new importance of PbT
What I have described could aptly be called ‘Project-based Thinking (PbT). This would involve a mode of learning and assessment that holds great promise as we reflect on the need for students to prepare themselves for the unknowable challenge of living and working in a world where AI is likely to suffuse everyday life in complex ways. The student who has learned to set for themself interesting, engaging, deep-seated challenges, addressing real-world issues such as climate change, well-being, social justice and technological innovation, has precisely the skill set and intellectual disposition needed to embrace AI as a tool for augmenting and supporting creative learning and expression. Indeed, we could say that one goal of education is to help develop project-based thinkers, who have the confidence, resilience and skills to take hold of the best available technological tools and apply them to creative problem-solving activities. The dramatic emergence of generative AI, far from being the harbinger of doom for project work in schools, highlights just how important it is that we go beyond a focus on examination outcomes and embrace deeper thinking and project processes as central elements in a future-facing pedagogy.
Emphasis on critical thinking over digesting facts is all part of the school’s ethos of developing ‘global citizens’.
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A pressing issue
If this is the case, we need to get on with things. Project-based Thinking not only deserves to infuse our secondary curricula, it has to. In the process, let us also think more deeply not only about the shortcomings of the written examination system, but also how we build the right kind of PbT skills into the curriculum and assessment systems for our students as they progress from primary into secondary education: this skill set, like any other, needs careful development over time and does not become suddenly relevant to students in their final years of secondary school.
Things are already under way. Just as the EPQ has brought about a quiet revolution in assessment and learning in British and British International Schools largely in Years 12 and 13, other opportunities for the rigorous development and assessment of Project-based Thinking are now available for Years 6 to 11 and deserve serious consideration.
Dr. John Taylor is Director of Curriculum, Innovation and International Education at Cranleigh School.
Join John at a special one-day conference at Cranleigh UK on Tuesday July 7th devoted to Project-based Thinking and its new role in a modern British and British International schools.
Read more.
Modernising Your Curriculum from within:
The EPQ and the Quiet Revolution of Project-based Thinking
A one-day Conference for British and British International Schools
July 7th, 2023, at Cranleigh School UK
To discover what project-based thinking looks like across the primary and secondary continuum in practice there is an opportunity to join John Taylor and Andy Homden, Editor of International Teacher Magazine for a one-day CPD conference at Cranleigh School on 7th July.
Please book your place here:
Cranleigh School Conference – Modernising Your Curriculum From Within
FEATURE IMAGE: by Getty Images For Unsplash+
Support Image: by Philip Oroni For Unsplash+
