This is an interesting discussion and one that I feel I should join.
Recently in Australia we had a student with severe disbilities who wished
to be assessed like all students. She wanted to be able to adequately
answer all questions on the exam paper without special consideration. This
meant that she needed 18 hours (over 3 days with rest breaks) to do a
standard 3 hour paper to produce the same length of essays with the paper
being split so that she only saw what she was required to do on that day.
This request was rejected by the examining body. She then took her case to
the State Equal Opportunity Board claiming discrimination on the basis that
she wanted to be assesed like all the other students without the assessor
knowing she had a disability. She eventually won her case and was able to
do her exam as suggested.
An interesting case that has certainly changed the thinking re special
consideration and what discrimination means.
Cheers to you all
Jenny
At 10:28 20/11/00 -0000, you wrote:
>HOw about talking to the department / examiners etc about the possibility of
>adjusting the ratio of assessed work and examined work? Alternatively, cut
>down the exam time - we have a physically disabled student who was never
>going to be able to show his full potential in a 3 hr exam with extra time.
>He contacted an educational psychologist, who has assessed him since
>childhood, who said rather bluntly in a report that if he was assessed in a
>3hr exam it would be unfair and discriminatory. We referred him to another
>ed. psych for advice on a suitable type of assessment. We then met with the
>department, who liaised with external examiners, and cutting a long story
>short, he is being assessed by a little extra coursework (not too much
>extra) and a cut-down exam, ie instead of answering 4 questions out of 8, he
>will, for example, answer 2 out of 4, with extra time, but still in total
>less than the full exam would have been.
>
>Hope this helps
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: [log in to unmask]
>[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of M.A.Archer
>Sent: 17 November 2000 16:11
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: extra time in exams
>
>
>Does anyone have any solutions to the problem of a student
>being allocated 50% extra time in exams, but then finding
>the exam too long? Even with a split exam, one of our
>students, who has a visual impairment, could be sitting
>four and a half hours of examination in one day.
>
>Mike Archer
>Disability Support Co-ordinator
>University of Kent at Canterbury
>01227 823119
>
>
>
>
>
Jenny Shaw
Disability Resource Centre
Deakin University
Geelong, Victoria, Australia 3220
ph & TTY: 3 52271427
fax: 3 52272829
email: [log in to unmask]
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