Seeds of Doubt: Learning lessons from item level marking
Pinot de Moira, Anne · 2013
Increases in reliability can be effected in many ways. It can be argued that mark reliability, in other words reliability of the final mark awarded to a candidate, can be increased by item level marking (see, for example, Wheadon & Pinot de Moira, 2012) or some form of multiple marking (see, for example, Meadows & Billington, 2005; Pilliner, 1968). In contrast, and here it is important to make a distinction, marking reliability can only be improved by examiner training and improvements to the assessment and mark scheme. This paper provides a mechanism by which to focus efforts on areas where changes to training and the assessment might improve marking reliability. Whilst technical in nature, the analysis in this paper is presented with the introduction of new operational practices in mind.