Tapping into the power of online peer assessment

Events Management employers seek graduates who can demonstrate that they can work in teams effectively. There are issues associated with assessing groupwork for both tutors and students. As most of the groupwork is completed outside of timetabled classes it is often difficult for the tutor to ascertain if the groupwork has been completed evenly amongst the group members. From a student’s perspective there are often feelings of unfairness associated with group assessments and demands for individual grades to be awarded based on contribution. The overall aim of this study is to understand what a best practice approach is to online peer assessment and to trial an online tool thus, reducing the workload for the tutor of a paper-based approach. An online peer assessment tool called SPARKPlus was used for this research. Second and final year BA Events Management students used SPARKPlus and the results of a post-trial survey were collated. Interviews were conducted with six students involved in the trial. The findings indicate that the students had a positive experience using SPARKPlus. They believe peer assessment is a fair method of assessing groupwork and individual grades should be awarded. These results concurred with the literature regarding what constitutes a best practice approach to online peer assessment. Furthermore, some new themes emerged which would warrant further future research; including formative peer assessment and introducing face to face feedback.