Abstract:

“Knowledge of contemporary issues” is one of the outcomes that must be included in the the programs of university degrees according to governmental regulations and accreditation agencies. Seminars are an interesting tool to train this outcome. The objective of the work here presented was to anaylise the use of seminars in a course belonging to the fourth year of the Biotechnology degree of the Universitat Politècnica de València. Seminars presented by groups of students were assesed by the teacher and by their mates. Besides a mark for the presentation and the exposition, students were asked to evaluate the interest of the seminar and the difficulty in understanding the topic presented. Data for three consecutive years were available, involving around 80 students per year. Specifically, the relationship between perception of the interest and the mark was analysed. The influence of the difficulty in understanding the topic and the mark was also explored. Moreover, correlation between the marks provided by the teacher and the mates was analysed.

Keywords:

Outcome, contemporary issues, seminars, peer-assessment.