6.6 Assess the fact that they did it

When students undertake a project for an external "client" there are problems with gauging and assessing the scope and difficulty of their work .

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This bundle identifies a series of tasks which, if completed, will count for the academic credit of the project, irrespective of what the student produces for the "client".

The way it works is that when the project is negotiated with the external (usually industrial) client, a series of tasks are identified whose completion will count for the academic credit of the project, irrespective of the marginal quality of the artefacts they deliver.

These might be in the form of a "learning contract" where the student has to ensure they undertake certain tasks to fulfil the educational objectives of the project, or they might be set in the context of an existing framework (such as the British Computer Society's Professional Development Scheme, see: http://www.bcs.org/pds). The fact that the student actually accomplishes the specified activities is certified by someone outside of the academic department (normally in the workplace).

It is assumed that the process and product of the work is satisfactory unless otherwise stated (by the external assessor). If satisfactory, it is sufficient that they have done the work; there is not enough added value in the detail to warrant a more fine-grained assessment process.

It doesn't work unless reliance is placed on the motivation and quality of the participants?students, academic supervisors and external (industrial) assessors.

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So: consider awarding academic credit for successful accomplishment of tasks, rather than assessing the products of those tasks.