Understanding Clauses 1.8 to 1.12: A Guide to Effective Training and Assessment for Your RTO

What is the Purpose of Clauses 1.8 to 1.12? The Clauses 1.8 to 1.12 are to ensure effective assessment.

Clause 1.8

The RTO (Registered Training Organisation) implements an assessment system to ensure that assessments, including recognition of prior learning, adhere to the following:

• Compliance with the assessment requirements of the relevant training package or VET-accredited course.
• Conducting assessments under the Principles of Assessment in Table 1.8-1 and the Rules of Evidence in Table 1.8-2.

Table 1.8-1: Principles of Assessment

Fairness

• Consideration of individual learner’s needs in the assessment process.
• Application of reasonable adjustments, where appropriate, to accommodate individual learner’s needs.
• Providing the learner with information about the assessment process and the opportunity to challenge the assessment result and request reassessment if necessary.

Flexibility

• Assessment flexibility tailored to individual learners, reflecting their needs.
• Assessment of competencies regardless of how or where they were acquired.
• Using appropriate assessment methods based on the context, the unit of competency, assessment requirements, and the individual.

Validity

• Justification of any assessment decision based on the evidence of the learner’s performance.
• Assessment against the unit/s of competency and associated assessment requirements covering a broad range of essential skills and knowledge.
• Integration of knowledge and skills assessment with practical application.
• Assessment based on evidence demonstrating the learner’s capability to apply skills and knowledge in different situations.

Reliability

• Consistent interpretation of evidence presented for assessment, ensuring comparable assessment results regardless of the assessor conducting the assessment.

Table 1.8-2: Rules of Evidence

Validity

• Assurance that the learner possesses the skills, knowledge, and attributes described in the module or unit of competency and associated assessment requirements.

Sufficiency

• Assurance that the quality, quantity, and relevance of assessment evidence allows for a competency judgment to be made.

Authenticity

• Assurance that the evidence presented for assessment is the learner’s work.

Currency

• Assurance that assessment evidence demonstrates current competency, requiring the evidence to be from the present or very recent past.

Clause 1.9

The RTO establishes a plan for systematic validation of assessment practices and judgments, including:

• Determining when assessment validation will occur.
• Identifying the training products to be validated.
• Assigning responsibilities for leading and participating in validation activities.
• Documenting the outcomes of these activities and taking appropriate actions based on the results.

Clause 1.10

Under clause 1.9, each training product is validated at least once every five years. Additionally, at least 50 percent of products are validated within the first three years of each five-year cycle, considering the relative risks associated with all training products on the RTO’s scope of registration, as identified by the VET regulator.

Clause 1.11

For clause 1.9, systematic validation of an RTO’s assessment practices and judgments is conducted by one or more individuals not directly involved in the specific delivery and assessment of the training product being validated. These individuals collectively possess the following:

On or before March 31, 2019:

• Vocational competencies and current industry skills relevant to the assessment being validated.
• Current knowledge and skills in vocational teaching and learning.
• The required training and assessment credential as specified in Schedule 1 (Item 1, Item 2, Item 4, or Item 5).

On or after April 1, 2019:

• Vocational competencies and current industry skills relevant to the assessment being validated.
• Current knowledge and skills in vocational teaching and learning.
• The training and assessment credential as specified in Schedule 1 TA (Item 2 or Item 5).
• Industry experts may be engaged in the validation process to ensure a combination of expertise as outlined in a) or b) above.

Clause 1.12

The RTO offers recognition of prior learning (RPL) to individual learners.

What Clauses 1.8 to 1.12 Mean for Your RTO?

The Standards ensure that graduates meet industry expectations as expressed in training packages and VET-accredited courses. They require RTOs to deliver training and assessment that allows students the opportunity and time to develop their skills and knowledge, practice, and demonstrate their skills in a holistic and meaningful way.

Your RTO must establish and implement a system to ensure that:

• Assessment judgments are consistently made on a sound basis.
• Validation of assessment judgments is carried out.

An assessment system encompasses not only the materials directly used in conducting assessments but also the policies, procedures, supporting documents, and tools that guide the assessment processes within your RTO.

For a student to be assessed as competent,

• your RTO must ensure that the student has absorbed the knowledge
• developed the skills
• can combine these to demonstrate their capability, including the ability to perform tasks in various workplace situations or accurately simulated ones.

A student must be assessed against all tasks identified in the elements of the unit or module and demonstrate competence in each.

When developing assessment materials, use information from the unit or module elements, performance criteria, and assessment requirements to determine competence. Ensure that assessment tools can be contextualised to the student cohort to produce valid skills relevant to the student’s industry or work context.

Use this information to set benchmarks for measuring the student’s performance based on observable behaviours. This will ensure that the student has actually undertaken all required tasks and demonstrated the ability to do so in different contexts and environments.

Assessment must always be based on the performance of the individual student. If assessment tasks are undertaken as a group, each student must be assessed on each task component.

Recognition of prior learning (RPL) is simply a form of competence assessment that uses evidence from formal, non-formal, and informal learning rather than specific directed assessment activities. Thus, RPL must be conducted with the same rigour as any other assessment form.

Assessment Requirements

Each unit of competency contains assessment requirements grouped into three areas:

• Performance evidence
• Knowledge evidence
• Assessment conditions

Performance evidence and knowledge evidence describe what a student must demonstrate to be considered competent. Assessment conditions detail the conditions under which a student must demonstrate this, including specific requirements for resources, trainers, assessors, and the context for assessment.

In planning assessment, ensure you address all requirements of the unit or module, including the performance criteria.

If your RTO applies any form of grading to students, ensure that this is applied only after the student has been assessed as fully competent and is in addition to determining competence or otherwise.

As similar requirements are often expressed in multiple units of competency, you can often cluster several units together for assessment to avoid repeating the assessment of the same tasks. Analyse each requirement across the cluster of units to determine where assessment methods are appropriate and where discrete assessment activities may be required.

Implementing the Principles of Assessment

No matter which assessment pathway or method you use, the principles of fairness, flexibility, validity, and reliability must be met.

Fairness

• Make recognition of prior learning available to all students at enrolment or before the training begins.
• Consider the student’s needs in the assessment process and make reasonable adjustments to accommodate them.
• Ensure that the student is fully informed of the assessment process and performance expectations before undertaking the assessment.
• If a student needs help to complete a required task to the described level, consider whether they need further training before being reassessed.

Flexibility

• Provide recognition of prior learning to all students.
• Take the students into account in the assessment process, recognising that they may have already demonstrated some aspects of the unit through other means.
• Use a range of assessment methods to ensure the validity of decisions.

Validity

• Assess students in various environments and contexts relevant to the unit or module.
• Ensure that assessment tasks and methods match the assessment requirements.
• Ensure skills are assessed by observing the student carrying out the relevant task.
• Ensure consistency in assessment, making sure the student consistently demonstrates competence.

Reliability

• Make assessment decisions consistently across students and assessors in the same unit or module.
• Provide an assessment system detailing the context and conditions for assessors to ensure consistent assessment application across different assessors and student cohorts.
• Develop evidence criteria for judging performance quality.

Implementing the Rules of Evidence

The evidence used to decide on competence must be valid, sufficient, authentic, and current.

Validity

• Ensure that evidence is directly related to the competency being assessed.
• Establish a direct relationship between the assessment task or activity, the evidence presented to the student, and the assessment requirements.

Sufficiency

• Gather enough evidence to make a valid competence judgment.
• Consider that the quantity of evidence may vary between students, and some may need more assessments to demonstrate competence.

Authenticity

• Ensure that the evidence belongs to the student being assessed and provides evidence of their skills and knowledge.
• Verify the student’s identity to be issued with a qualification or statement of attainment, regardless of the delivery method.

Currency

• Determine the validity of the evidence concerning the time that has passed since it was generated.
• Assess whether the evidence demonstrates current competence at the time of the assessment decision.

Validation of Assessment

Validation is the process of reviewing assessment judgments made by your RTO. It should confirm that the assessment tools produce valid, reliable, sufficient, current, and authentic evidence, enabling reasonable judgments on the training package or VET-accredited course requirements. Validation should include engagement with the industry to ensure graduates possess the skills and knowledge required by the industry.

Sampling Approach to Validation

Validation should follow a valid sampling approach to ensure all assessment judgments have been made correctly. A well-considered sample size, reflective of all assessment judgments, provides a reliable quality review process. Validators should be independent of the delivery and assessment of the specific training product being validated.

Choosing Validators

Validators should have appropriate qualifications, vocational competencies, current industry skills and knowledge, knowledge of vocational teaching and learning, and training and assessment credentials. Sometimes, a team of validators may collectively possess the required expertise. Ensure that validators maintain professional distance and integrity.

Retention of Evidence

Your RTO should retain evidence demonstrating the effectiveness of your assessment system. This may include records of validation activities, outcomes, and actions taken in response to these outcomes. Additionally, you should retain assessment materials and evidence of compliance with Standard 1.

In summary, your RTO must adhere to the standards to ensure the integrity of qualifications and the quality of training. This involves implementing effective assessment practices, validation, and aligning practices with your assessment system and validation plan. Retain assessment evidence to demonstrate that your assessment system is effective and that you meet the required standards for compliance.

How to Demonstrate and Provide Evidence of Compliance for Your RTO

ASQA’s regulatory experience reveals that many RTOs face challenges when it comes to demonstrating compliance with Standard 1, particularly with clause 1.8. This raises concerns about the credibility of the qualifications awarded and, in the long run, can erode student and employer trust in the education system’s outcomes.

To establish that your RTO adheres to your assessment system and validation plan, consider the sources of information that can verify the alignment of your RTO’s practices and assessment methods, including your validation activities. One example of this alignment could involve ensuring that completed student assessments are accurately documented in the corresponding student files and are consistent with the designated assessment tools. Sufficient assessment evidence must be retained to support the validation of assessment judgments.

ASQA’s Guidance for Providers – Retention requirements for completed student assessment items mandates that RTOs keep all completed assessment items related to each unit or module for a minimum of six months from the date when the decision of competency for the specific unit or module was made. If retaining the actual item is impractical (e.g., for construction projects or perishable items), maintaining evidence like photographs demonstrating the quality of the item or work completed justifying the assessment outcome is acceptable. Completed assessment items, such as assignments, should not be returned to students until the six-month retention period has lapsed. During performance assessments (audits), ASQA will request the production of only those assessment records that your RTO is obligated to retain.

To determine whether the assessment aligns with the unit of competency or cluster of units, assessment evidence can be compared against the following criteria:

• The decision is grounded in sound assessment practices.
• The decision is made after a comprehensive evaluation of the evidence against all relevant requirements, including the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.

In cases where assessment is conducted through recognition of prior learning, the Standards’ requirements remain unchanged. However, a wider variety of evidence may need to be collected and considered when making the assessment decision compared to traditional assessment methods. Similarly, the Standards apply equally to distance and online delivery methods, but the type of evidence considered may need to be adjusted. Regardless of the mode of delivery, all assessments must adhere to the same Standards.

A critical element in determining the adequacy of assessment is the evidence criteria used by your assessors to assess the quality of performance and make their decisions.

These criteria may take the form of:

• Model answers or responses
• Samples of work that meet specifications
• General guidance for assessors regarding the characteristics of satisfactory responses or behaviours.

The level of specificity in such materials depends on the nature of the unit, with units from lower AQF level qualifications often requiring more prescriptive “correct” responses, while higher-level units may have broader guidelines.

Additionally, you must maintain evidence that demonstrates:

• Execution of your validation plan
• The resulting outcomes
• Actions taken based on lessons learned from validation, including improvements made to assessment tools, processes, and practices, as well as how staff have been involved in understanding and implementing these outcomes.

Tips on Compliant Practice – Effective Assessment

• Use checklists to address all training package requirements in assessments, adhering to the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.
• Clearly define the assessment task for assessors and students, including context, conditions, timing, and the assessment environment.
• Ensure tasks for observing practical skills include observable behaviours and align with unit requirements.
• Assess the practical application of knowledge and skills through observations.
• Avoid an overreliance on document-driven knowledge assessment.
• Benchmark criteria should be well-defined, allowing assessors to judge a candidate’s competency.
• Assessments should enable consistent demonstrations of competence in multiple situations and over time.
• Completed assessment records should include information on the candidate’s performance, the criteria covered, and the basis for competency determination.
• Check that assessment criteria address foundation skills and oral communication skills.
• Clarify the type of third-party report used (actual assessment or supplementary evidence) and provide clear instructions to third parties.

Suggested Read: A Practical Guide to ASQA Training and Assessment Strategy