Framing the activities of institutions and academic development units in support of assessment

Abstract

The assessment‐related activities of academic development units (ADU) are driven not only by institutional initiatives and the pursuit of particular research interests but also by less predictable factors including the emerging needs of faculty members and external funding opportunities. When not located within a strong classification framework, institutional initiatives and the activities of ADUs can be experienced as fragmented and episodic events, a situation that denies participants and other stakeholders a sense of striving towards and achieving substantial goals. This paper proposes two classification frameworks – one for the organisation of the types of initiatives that universities commonly undertake in encouraging enhanced assessment practice and another for the functions of the ADU. Application of the two organisational frameworks offers a systematic approach to the development of institutional assessment plans and informs the ways in which the resources of the academic development unit can be deployed most strategically in their operationalisation.