Abstract:

The Erasmus+ project ‘DigitalHEIghts’ aims to promote a sustainable pathway for transforming online assessment of learning and to support the digital upskilling of academics in digital assessment through the development of digital readiness, resilience and capacity by making use of the DigComp Edu framework for Higher Education (HE). As part of the needs analysis, the authors gathered data across 19 European countries including the five partner countries in this project, i.e., Austria, Cyprus, Germany, Italy and Portugal. In the first stage of the needs analysis, a survey was undertaken with educators across Europe to evaluate their digital competence in online assessment. This article focuses on the second stage of the needs analysis and investigates potential disciplinary differences in the competencies of academics concerning digital assessment within the DigComp Edu framework and the areas of chemistry, economic sciences, information science and engineering, environmental and geosciences, life sciences, mathematics, physics, social sciences and humanities. The article begins with the rationale for the ‘DigitalHEIghts’ project. This is followed by a literature review on online learning and disciplinary differences. There is some literature to indicate that online learning is perceived differently among academic disciplines. For example, it has been argued that in the disciplines of business and management, education, mathematics and engineering, in comparison to law and art and design, elearning is more prominent. This, however, does not tell us much about the competencies of academics vis-à-vis online assessment. The article continues with the methodology for the data collection and analysis and finally, it elaborates specifically on digital assessment competencies among the disciplines covered.

Keywords:

Digital assessment, online assessment, competencies, digital upskilling, digital competence, educators, higher education, e-learning, student learning.