The Royal College of Art began a number of projects to transform student experience, including the introduction of a new Student Information System (SIS) to support the student journey from application to commencement. The Portfolio sits within the application stage of the project - as is the nature of art and design, all applicants must submit a portfolio of work for assessment as part of the admissions process. As portfolio submissions are a more complex aspect of the process, a specialist product was needed to meet the desired requirements.The overarching aim of this new portfolio submission tool was to:
• Provide an excellent accessible user experience for both applicants and academic reviewers.
• Give applicants the best opportunity to succeed.
• Streamline the review and offer process.
The RCA wanted to reduce the focus on interviews and increase the focus on assessing the products, projects and outputs of an applicant; interviews were to be used for clarification rather than by default as in previous years. PebblePad was seen as a flexible tool which allowed us to gather this content in a user-friendly way and also allowed us to review and collect the data of application effectively.The case study outline how the process from concept to product was completed in multiple stages involving staff from across the College.
The above case study is just one of twenty-five brilliant examples from our 2020 'Charting new courses in learning and teaching' conference. With case studies spanning degree apprenticeships, clinical assessment, interprofessional education, showcase portfolios, and many other contexts and disciplines, they are real stories of trailblazing innovation. If you'd like to download all 25 exemplars of pedagogical goodness, click the link below.
