Abstract:

According to Jönsson and Panadero, rubrics are “assessment instruments designed to assist in identifying and evaluating qualitative differences in student performance” [1]. Although the use of rubrics in education started in the late 1990s, their implementation at Higher Education level has been delayed. At the very beginning, rubrics were not trusted as a reliable method to assess more complicated learning objectives. However, they have been proved to be both a consistent and fair evaluation tool, hence they are currently considered an outstanding approach for formative assessment.

In the academic year 20/21, the Multidisciplinary Teaching Team at the Faculty of Pharmacy, at the University of Granada, has included in its training program a formative course devoted to introducing teaching staff to this novel assessment tool. This course encouraged the use and design of rubrics among teachers and promoted their implementation in different teaching areas through practical examples. Discussions on such results highlighted three main outcomes:
(1) the need for careful planning;
(2) the use of concise instructions within the rubric; and
(3) a clear and proper correlation to the learning objectives described in the learning guides.

In this work, we will analyze the use of rubrics in Higher Education and provide several examples that were implemented after their development during the aforementioned formative course. The satisfaction survey carried out on students and teachers will be also shared, followed by a discussion on the advantages and disadvantages encountered during the implementation, under a pedagogic point of view.

Acknowledgements.
The Multidisciplinary Teaching Team of the Faculty of Pharmacy thanks the Department of Teaching Quality and Innovation of the University of Granada the funding provided for the proposal presented at the “X CONVOCATORIA DE EQUIPOS DOCENTES DE FORMACIÓN INICIAL DEL PROFESORADO Y EQUIPOS DOCENTES DE FORMACIÓN CONTINUA. FASE I”

References:
[1] A. Jönsson, E. Panadero (2017). The use and design of rubrics to support assessment for learning. In D. Carless, S. Bridges, C. Chan, & R. Glofcheski (Eds.), Scaling up assessment for learning in higher education. The enabling power of assessment (pp. 99–111). Springer.

Keywords:

Rubric, assessment, multidisciplinary teaching team, formative assessment, collaborative teaching.