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ERIC Number: ED260680
Record Type: RIE
Publication Date: 1985-Oct
Pages: 24
Abstractor: N/A
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
Assessment in Professional Education.
Elman, Sandra E.; Lynton, Ernest A.
The assessment of professional programs at the undergraduate level is discussed (i.e., engineering, business, education, nursing, and other career-oriented fields). Presently, assessment in professional education relies almost exclusively on written or oral testing of a predetermined set of cognitive and analytical skills. This is followed by assessment of the ability to apply these skills to predetermined and well-defined problems and cases. Professional education and assessment need to focus more on the process of defining problems and making instrumental judgments, using a variety of real and simulated clinical experiences. Professionals need to be able to make choices among a number of possibilities, each of which optimizes one or more competing values. Professional competence requires dealing with complexity, tolerance for ambiguity, coping with discontinuity and disequilibrium, and risk-taking. Self-assessment is emerging as an integral part of professional competence, and, therefore, must become part of professional education. The effective use of the following methods in assessment are addressed: the case study method; simulation, role playing, and group discussion; and small group interactions. Specific reference is made to the education of engineers, managers, and medical personnel. (SW)
Publication Type: Opinion Papers; Speeches/Meeting Papers
Education Level: N/A
Audience: Practitioners
Language: English
Sponsor: National Inst. of Education (ED), Washington, DC.
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Note: Paper presented at the National Conference on Assessment in Higher Education, sponsored by the American Association for Higher Education, (Columbia, SC, October 13-15, 1985). Broken print will affect legibility.