Registrar and Chief Executive Officer of the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC), Dr. Wayne Wesley believes that the current educational construct must be reimagined, reformed, and repositioned. He was delivering remarks at the CXC 48th International Association for Educational Assessment (IAEA) annual conference at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in Kingston from 24-29 September.
“One thing that is common among us is the emerging fact [that] from the Covid-19 Pandemic…there is a collective consciousness and understanding and realization that the current educational construct must be reimagined, reformed and repositioned, particularly educational assessment,” Dr. Wesley said.
According to him, in this regard, digital innovation has proven to be optimally efficient and effective in alleviating many of the challenges that characterize the pre-pandemic systems of assessment.
“Within this global educational village, the imperative that confronts us is to ensure that we navigate the new paradigm of digital innovation that will see us creating that balance for security and efficiency with validity and reliability,” Dr. Wesley noted.
He continued, “This is important as we preserve the integrity of the assessment systems we are using to certify competence.”
Furthermore, Dr. Wesley indicated that strategically, the hosting of this international conference this year is particularly significant as the council celebrates 50 years of dedicated service to the people and government of the region for over 16 CARICOM member-states.
Meanwhile, Minister of State in the Ministry of Education and Youth of Jamaica, Marsha Smith said that the ministry welcomes this focus on digitizing assessments and credentials given the expansion in the criteria for assessing students’ competencies as well as advancing in digital technology over the past few years.
“These developments are pushing individuals and institutions to adjust more rapidly to a world of data, software, artificial intelligence, and the general use of technology,” she stated.
In fact, Smith believes that the staging of the conference in Jamaica is timely, “given the steps that we here in Jamaica have taken to launch the National School Leaving Certificate (NSLC) later this year.”
According to Smith, the program recognizes the achievement of students and a wide range of achievements beyond their academics.
The 48th Annual IAEA conference in collaboration with CXC®, will include inception workshops, keynote addresses, symposiums, and open paper and poster presentations. The Conference Paper Review Committee welcomes submissions corresponding to one or more of the sub-themes. All submissions will be reviewed by the Conference Paper Review Committee considering their scientific quality and relevance within the conference theme. The deadline for submissions is 21 April 2023.
Details of the event can be found at the Conference website: https://iaea2023.org
The conference is being observed under the theme: “Digitalising Assessments and Credentials”.
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