SA schools to work with University of Melbourne on ‘learner profiles’ as ATAR alternative

Could a “learner profile” give universities a better picture of students’ abilities than the ATAR by itself?

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South Australian schools will be at the forefront of a push to have students’ abilities judged by more than just their ATAR.

A dozen public and private schools will work with the University of Melbourne on a two-year project to create a “learner profile” system, giving unis and employers a more rounded picture on which to assess applicants.

The “learner profile” concept came to prominence late last year, when a sample version devised by the SACE Board appeared in the national Beyond ATAR report.

As well as traditional grades, that version envisaged a “traffic light” system to show how well students transfer subject knowledge to real problems, and their strengths in areas such as creativity and entrepreneurial thinking.

The SA Secondary Principals Association for public schools, Catholic Education SA, and Association of Independent Schools of SA will collaborate on the new project.

SASPA president Peter Mader said the first aim was to develop “valid, reliable and useful assessments” of the “general capabilities” in the Australian Curriculum.

They include critical and creative thinking, personal and social capability, ethical understanding and intercultural understanding, as well as literacy, numeracy and IT.

The second aim was to work out how to combine them, and other “complex competencies” like entrepreneurial thinking, with regular grades into a profile.

“The motivation for this project is to have schools play a leading role in creating a broader definition of student success than the ATAR,” Mr Mader said.

“Essentially our interest is to have every student’s knowledge, skill and disposition development mapped and tracked through a learner profile to more adequately reflect their growth as learners than current reporting and accreditation systems.”

Some advocates of the learner profile idea say they should also take into account skills attained through extra-curricular activities and part-time jobs as well as school studies.

But that has attracted criticism that it would advantage students from wealthy backgrounds who have the best access to opportunities outside of school.

Association of Independent Schools of SA chief executive Carolyn Grantskalns said the focus of the pilot, at least at first, would be looking at what happens “within school”.

She said the “capabilities” were already embedded in the curriculum, so it was a matter of finding ways to assess them.

“There’s a lot of interest at school level in trying to find ways to report on the things that the ATAR can’t,” she said.

“We are interested in a more rounded and more wholistic picture of what a student is able to do.”

An employer or uni might favour a student with more rounded abilities than one with just good raw grades, she said.

Catholic Education SA said the project aimed at recognising the abilities “young people need to develop in order to thrive in and beyond school”.

“This is about re-imagining the way we do secondary learning and providing a stronger alignment with each young person’s aspirations and chosen career pathway,” curriculum, learning and wellbeing manager Anna Mirasgentis said.

The schools to take part in the trial are yet to be announced, and in some cases have not been finalised.