Assessment of
Student Learning

Professor Geoff Masters AO

BSc, MEd, UWA, PhD Chicago, FACE, FACEL
Chief Executive Officer, ACER

Professor Geoff Masters is CEO of the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) and a leading international authority on the assessment of student learning. Over the past three decades he has written extensively on the reform of educational assessment processes, including in his 2013 report Reforming Educational Assessment: Imperatives, Principles and Challenges. He has authored and co-authored a wide range of assessment materials and professional resources, including the TORCH Tests of Reading Comprehension, the Developmental Assessment Resource for Teachers (DART) and the Assessment Resource Kit (ARK). Prof Masters has been a prolific contributor to the international literature on assessment, with many of his articles now available online. He was chair of the Technical Committee of the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement; was closely involved in the introduction of literacy and numeracy tests throughout Australia; co-authored the first national report on literacy levels in Australian primary schools; and has provided advice to national and state governments on assessment, reporting and certification in the senior secondary school.

Professor Masters is the Unit Coordinator for Unit 3 (Estimating Student Progress) of the Graduate Certificate course. In this Unit, students are introduced to a key step in any assessment process: drawing conclusions about where learners are in their learning from observations of their performances on assigned tasks. This Unit builds on Unit 2 in which students consider a variety of methods for gathering observations about student learning and considerations in using these different assessment methods. Unit 3 introduces the concept of a conclusion (or inference) about the point an individual has reached in his or her learning – a conclusion that can be either numerical or based on teacher judgement. In either case, an on-balance decision is required. The Unit also provides a basic introduction to the reporting of results from different tests on a learning progression and outlines common errors and biases that need to be managed in making judgements about where students are in their learning.

Researcher Profile

Dr Nathanael Reinertsen

BA, GradDipEd, MEd, PhD
Research Fellow, ACER

Dr Nathanael Reinertsen is a Research Fellow at ACER, in the Assessment and Reporting (Humanities & Social Sciences) program of the Assessment and Psychometrics division. He works in a team developing reading and writing assessments for state, national and international clients. In his time at ACER, he has worked on a number of Australian and international assessments, including high-stakes selection tests and national assessments.

Prior to joining ACER he worked as a high school English teacher in Western Australia, in both government and non-government schools. He held positions as Head of English and Campus Coordinator at a multi-campus private school which highlighted for him how important sound assessment methods and moderation practices are for schools.

Researcher Profile

Dr Claire Scoular

BSc, MSc, PhD
Research Fellow, ACER

Dr Scoular's work focuses on the improvement of assessment practices through the application of psychological measurement. Specifically, her expertise revolves around the assessment and teaching of 21st century skills. She has worked with numerous countries to identify and bridge the gap between their assessment, curriculum, and pedagogy in relation to skills. In particular, she has worked with many developing countries to review and develop curriculum documentation, develop classroom-based assessment tools and generate teaching resources for skills including problem solving, collaboration, learning in digital networks, critical thinking, creative thinking, and self-regulation. She has been an active lecturer for many years and has developed courses in both traditional formats and online formats, including both the design of the content, and the assessment tasks.

At the University of Melbourne, her PhD identified a measurement methodology of 21st century skills through automated scoring and test delivery systems. Her experience in psychometric assessment, intervention work and research spans across the UK, the Asia-Pacific, and South America. She has undertaken consultancies for UNICEF, WorldBank, The Brookings Institution, and UNESCO. Dr Scoular has been a Keynote Speaker on multiple occasions, and recently served as a presenter and mentor to delegates at the Y20 Youth Summit.  

Researcher Profile

Professor Pauline Taylor-Guy

BA (Hons), PGCE, PhD
Director, Centre for School and System Improvement, ACER

Professor Pauline Taylor-Guy is the Director of the Centre for School and System Improvement and has oversight of ACER’s postgraduate and professional learning courses. She has over 30 years’ experience as a teacher, principal and educational leader in the UK, Africa and Australia.

Prior to joining ACER in early 2016, Professor Taylor-Guy held a range of academic leadership roles in the Higher Education sector. She has an extensive publication record in the scholarship of teaching and learning and a particular interest in professional learning, education policy, and language and literacy learning. She is the recipient of a number of teaching and research awards including an ALTC citation for outstanding contribution to student learning and reviews for a series of prestigious education journals and organisations. She has been the elected Secretary of the Australian Teacher Education Association since 2010 and a life member of the volunteer teacher education organisation Teachers Across Borders.

Researcher Profile

Dr Zachary Watts

BAppSci, GradDipEd, PhD
Research Fellow and Test Developer, ACER

Dr Zachary Watts is a Research Fellow at ACER, working in the Assessment and Psychometric Research division. He came to ACER with a background in teaching, with a speciality in Chemistry and Science education, working with students from primary to tertiary levels.

Dr Watts has worked on item writing and test design for state-wide, national and international testing programs, covering curriculum based tests, tests of scientific reasoning, as well as critical and quantitative reasoning assessments used to select students for entry into secondary, tertiary and post-graduate courses. These testing programs utilise the Rasch model to analyse the performance of individual items and the larger test construction in order to maximise the information that can be obtained about student performance.

Dr Eunjung Lee

PhD, MA, BA
Research Fellow, Psychometrics and Methodology Research Program, ACER

Dr Eunjung Lee is a Research Fellow in Psychometrics and Methodology at ACER. She has worked on numerous projects conducting psychometric analysis including test analysis and scale construction based on Item Response Theory. She is experienced in producing performance reports. Eunjung also has knowledge and experience in statistical modelling of data in educational research for national and international assessments and surveys.

Dr Xiaoxun Sun

BSc, MSc, PhD
Senior Research Fellow, Psychometrics and Methodology Research Program, ACER

Dr Xiaoxun Sun is a Senior Research Fellow in Psychometrics and Methodology at ACER. Since joining ACER in 2010, he has lead several national and international projects with psychometric analysis and reporting using IRT models. He has knowledge and experience in quantitative research design, statistical modelling and IRT modelling of assessment data for scale construction and tests equating.

His research interest lies in the area of psychometrics such as Computer Adaptive Testing, Differential Item Functioning (DIF) analysis, Dimensionality Assessment, various IRT Models, etc. Additionally, he is also interested in the area of Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining, Social Network Analysis, especially on applying data mining and machine learning technology to the educational data.

Dr Fabienne van der Kleij 

BSc, MSc, PhD
Research Fellow and Online Facilitator, Centre for School and System Improvement, ACER

Dr Fabienne van der Kleij is a Research Fellow in ACER’s Centre for School and System Improvement. Her expertise is in educational assessment, feedback to improve student learning, educational design, educational psychology and school improvement. She has a particular interest in feedback effectiveness from the student perspective. Dr van der Kleij is currently teaching for the Australian Council for Educational Research in educational assessment.  

Prior to joining ACER in late 2020, Dr van der Kleij worked in academia, where she conducted research into educational assessment and feedback to improve student learning. She undertook a PhD in computer-based feedback at Cito Institute for Educational Measurement (the Netherlands), where she also worked on various assessment-related projects. Dr van der Kleij has internationally recognised expertise in educational assessment and feedback. She has published extensively in academic and professional outlets and has presented at major international educational assessment conferences.