New continuous assessment plan quizzed over group project weighting

Parents at a town hall on Thursday warned that group project marks could penalise hardworking pupils as they challenged education officials to explain how continuous assessment would protect individual achievement under the proposed primary‑to‑secondary placement model.

The officials sought to reassure parents about the continuous assessment component of the proposed replacement for the Barbados Secondary School Entrance Examination, which would now account for 50 per cent of a student’s placement score.

But Raphael Saul, the father of a nine-year-old who would join the first cohort under the proposed system in September, suggested that while he supported project-based learning and recognised the value of collaboration, a student’s placement score could be influenced by others’ performance in a group.

He first asked whether students would receive marks only for their individual contribution or whether a group score would also form part of their overall assessment.

Deputy Chief Education Officer for Planning and Development Reverend Stephen Scott confirmed that both would count.

“So there is a group component, and there’s the individual component,” Rev Scott said.

“Both components will receive a mark, and combined, then the student will receive that mark.”

Rev Scott likened the approach to the School-Based Assessment (SBA) used in English at the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) level, in which students collaborate on research before producing an individual piece of work.

“So therefore at the end of the day you do get a group mark for those other aspects and then you get also that individual mark as part of your mark,” he said.

But Saul argued that while group projects are valuable for teaching teamwork and collaboration, they should not affect the score used to determine a child’s placement in secondary school.

“I am very on the same page with you as it relates to group projects and their value,” he said.

“The challenge I have, though… is that a child who may work well individually and who may even contribute well in his or her group can end up in a situation… where the group’s grade ends up reducing their overall score. 

“In my view, respectfully, that does not in fact produce the result that the ministry wants because what the ministry wants, as I understand it, is a better picture of a child’s individual ability.”

He suggested that group projects remain an important teaching tool, but recommended that only a student’s individual contribution be used to calculate the continuous assessment score for placement purposes.

In response, acting Chief Education Officer Julia Beckles stressed that the projects should not be viewed as one-off assignments but as the culmination of a two-year learning process.

Acting Chief Education Officer Julia Beckles. (Photo Credit: Barbados TODAY)

“When we talk about the projects, we are talking about the end of a process,” Beckles said.

“All along the process, the child is being taught. First of all, the child is being taught. Yes, the child is being evaluated. The teacher is taking note of strengths, taking note of weaknesses, and more importantly, the teacher now has the time to try to assist in the child’s improvement in the areas where weaknesses have been identified.”

Students would be supported throughout the process and develop collaboration skills over time, rather than simply being placed in groups and assessed, she said.

“It is not as if they are just going to be thrown into groups and that’s it… All of that is part of the learning that will be taking place over a two-year period.”

Acting Deputy Chief Education Officer Denise Charles encouraged parents to view the proposed assessments differently from traditional school projects.

“What our students will be doing will not just be projects. It is project-based learning.

“The emphasis is on creativity, individual expression.”

She noted that students would have opportunities to demonstrate their learning through videos, music, dance, the arts, and other creative approaches, rather than being limited to written reports or presentations.

“So it’s not going to be limited to writing a project and typing it up in Word or creating a PowerPoint [presentation],” Charles said.

“It’s going to be far more dynamic and creative than that.”

The proposed approach reflects a broader vision for education that prepares students with the collaboration, creativity and problem-solving skills needed in a changing world, Charles said.

“This is not the Barbados of the Common Entrance exam as we know it,” she said. “This is a different Barbados.”

Saul’s concerns were among several raised during the occasionally emotional town hall meeting, as parents questioned why the assessments would begin in Class Three, whether the first cohort — described as “COVID kids” who began their education remotely — had already endured enough disruption, and the weighting assigned to group projects.

Several parents claimed they left without the clarity they were seeking, arguing that key questions had not been answered directly.

(SM)