Supporting the Implementation and Use of Programmatic Assessment in Dentistry

Supporting the Implementation and Use of Programmatic Assessment in Dentistry.

Professional ‘competence is not just about acquisition of knowledge and skills, but about the ability to create new knowledge in response to changing work processes’ (Govaerts et al, 2013). The measurement of competence requires not only assessment in the Clinical domain, but also in the of Professionalism, Management & Leadership, Communication, and Knowledge domains. However, it is widely accepted that making credible and trustworthy decisions about readiness to progress is challenging, and existing approaches have significant limitations with respect to validity. Sophisticated approaches to the triangulation and integration of data are required, to both establish real-word performance, and support personalised learner development through reflection and feedback. Programmatic assessment (PA) offers a potential solution to these challenges through an approach that leverages continuous, longitudinal, data, informed by rich narrative feedback. Dental curricula may be well-placed to implement PA, through thoughtful adaptation of traditional approaches to clinical teaching.

The workshop will be of particular relevant to those interested in:

• Making defensible decisions
• Using assessment systems
• Learner development though assessment
• Technology-supported assessment/curriculum management
• Instilling a culture of self-reflection