How can we activate and create assessment systems that lead to a flourishing school where everyone is able to fulfil their potential and achieve both success and well-being? How might we shift assessment practices toward equity and justice/fairness? How do the assessment methods meet the diversity of the students? The research project SHIFT (Shaping and Inspiring a Fair Thinking in assessment) aims to investigate how a range of emerging trends within the international community can be used to answer these questions. These trends concern the literature on: (1) human capabilities (Sen, 1999) as a framework for ‘social justice’, (2) Assessment for Learning (Swaffield, 2011) as the horizon for understanding assessment, (3) Universal Design for Assessment (CAST, 2011) as the philosophy that attempts to go beyond the ‘model of adjustment’ and (4) such approaches as: fair and equitable assessment (Tierney, 2013; Montenegro & Jankowski, 2020), culturally-responsive assessment (Nortvedt et al., 2020), inclusive and universal assessment (Waterfield & West, 2006; Nieminen, 2022; Tai et al., 2021).

An increased focus on equity and justice emerges from the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, where the commitment is to provide inclusive and equitable quality education at all levels, as well as from other European and international documents (OECD, 2012, 2005; UNESCO, 2015, 2022). The same concern is evident in empirical studies focused mainly in higher education contexts (Nieminen, 2022; Tai et al., 2021), and what has become evident as more and more assessment researchers and practitioners engage with the equity conversation is the desire for considering these issues also in school context. Moreover most assessment research is based on what can be described as a ‘technical perspective’, looking at whether assessment is efficient, reliable, valid, leaving less space for a “humanistic” perspective that highlights assessment to foster learning for human flourishing and for responsibility toward and within society (Swaffield, 2011; Fuller, 2012; Gergen & Gill, 2020; Hadji, 2021).

Dialogue into the paradigms of assessment is of paramount importance if assessment aims at embracing a focus on equity, ethics, and humanization and meeting the challenges of these times. The paradigm shift was initiated many years ago, moving from assessment of learning towards assessment for learning, giving greater attention on the role of learners (opening the way to participatory approaches connecting school and community), on a shift from product to process-focused assessment and on a view of learning as a lifelong process rather than something done to prepare for an exam. Although these changes have been partially incorporated into the debate about educational assessment, work remains to be done to ensure the necessary attention to the issue of diversity among learners. Such an approach would strengthen the value of the shift and enlarge the potential of the assessment process towards the promotion of all students’ learning and growth moving away from a model of adjustments, which makes specific reasonable accommodations for some students towards assessment models that allow all students to fully participate and learn in the most equitable way.

Coherently with the theoretical framework, the research design addresses the importance of engagement, participation and opportunities for access, choosing a community-based approach interconnected with the appreciative one, seeking to produce a new imaginary for approaches to assessment, with implications for both cultures and practices. The aim of the Programme is to connect assessment with justice and equity through a participatory process sustaining the shift towards a fair thinking in assessment.

SHIFT intends to give value to bottom-up research practices articulating the logic and the flow of Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) and Appreciative Inquiry as follows. At this point, steps 1 and 2 have been implemented. STEP 1: Discovering & identifying the community: implemented through an initial phase consisting in different activities of Public Engagement (PEa). The following activities have been realised to raise awareness and mutual understanding (by establishing a common language and participatory multi-actor dialogues) and to promote and develop a shared assessment literacy about inclusiveness and diversity: an open webinar day devoted to the discussion of the main topics about accessibility and equity; a website; the identification of a logo for the project; initiatives specifically oriented to schools (‘dialoghi pedagogici’); a blog about the research keywords. PEa represented the ground on which a Call to Action (CtA) will be opened as a strategy for discovering engagement. It has been devoted to the schools of all educational levels in order to collect concern about the key issues and co-constructing the community of research, composed by a network of 7 schools (from early childhood level to middle school level). Moreover, a group of 250 prospective teachers were involved in the research with the aim of exploring the same issues with pre-service teachers in order to explore different understandings and purposes of assessment in the two groups (Brown, Remesal, 2012). STEP 2. Dreaming & Co-creating shared images of a preferred future. Based on the results of the CtA, the step 2 invites to begin “envisioning together”: asking themselves “what might be?” imagining and envisioning how things might work well in the future. Therefore the aim is collaborating for identifying and fostering the capacity to aspire and imagine possible and future actions. Instruments used are the following: panel discussions with teachers (one for each of the 7 schools, for a total of 60 involved teachers from early childhood to secondary school level, and 4 panel discussions with 50 students enrolled in teacher education programs from 5 different countries -UK, Turkey, Lithuania, Netherlands and Portugal); written interviews administered to 200 students enrolled in the teacher education program at University of Padova. These questions guided the reflection: How might we shift assessment practices toward equity and accessibility? How might we assess for learning and growth of all students? How assessment methods meet the diversity of the students?

First analyses from the panel discussions and written interviews with pre-service and in-service teachers show that assessment is fair when the following aspects become relevant: assessment as an integral part of the teaching strategy (use of assessment by the teacher to make teaching decisions and the consequent need to consider changes in teaching and assessment jointly and reciprocally); the “pedagogical” process as distinct from the “administrative” process (the process of reflection and use of evaluation criteria not confused with the attribution of the mark/grading); communication (need to pay attention to the communication moments -in progress and final-, both to the students and their families; need to act for change in the field of assessment by working on all dimensions -student, family, teachers, school head- in a parallel and integrated way. Differences in narratives by pre- and in-service teachers will be presented. Next steps 3 and 4 concern the design of innovative ways to bring into existence the preferred future participants have envisioned in the Dream step through the use of participatory videos (Boni et al., 2020) and the realisation of a narrative storytelling process for sustaining the change in assessment culture and practice towards fair assessment. Expected final outcomes consist of: - an open digital toolkit for a fair assessment: flexible/modular in its structure/implementation, accessible and usable. Examples of the toolkit contents: a guide for a universal approach to assessment; guidelines (with different resources, tips and examples) for designing accessible and universal assessments; good practices of fair assessment. - multimedia open educational resources (OER, Wiley, 2006) with the aim to offer an open learning path for all those who want to be self-trained in the research topics (audiovisual material, references and readings, simulations, workshops, guides about assessment contents, multimedia resources from public engagement activities and participatory videos).

Aquario D. (2021). Through the lens of justice. A systematic review on equity and fairness in learning assessment. Education Sciences & Society, 2, 96-110. Brown G. T. L., & Remesal A. (2012). Prospective teachers’ conceptions of assessment: A cross- cultural comparison. The Spanish Journal of Psychology, 15(1), 75–89. Bushe G. R. (2012). Foundations of Appreciative Inquiry: History, Criticism,and Potential. AI Practitioner: The International Journal of AI Best Practice, 14 (1), pp. 8-20. Center for Applied Special Technology (2011). Universal Design for Learning (UDL). Guidelines version 2.0, CAST, Wakefield. Hanesworth P., Bracken S. and Elkington S. (2019). A typology for a social justice approach to assessment: Learning from universal design and culturally sustaining pedagogy. Teaching in Higher Education, 24 (1), 98-114. Heritage M., & Wylie C. (2018). Reaping the benefits of assessment for learning: achievement, identity, and equity. ZDM, 50 (4), 729–741. Klenowski V. (2014). Towards fairer assessment. Australian Educational Researcher, 41, 445–470. Levy, J., & Heiser, C. (2018). Inclusive assessment practice (Equity Response). Urbana, IL: University of Illinois and Indiana University, NILOA. McArthur J. (2016). Assessment for social justice: the role of assessment in achieving social justice. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 41, 7, 967-981. Montenegro E., & Jankowski N. A. (2020). A new decade for assessment: Embedding equity into assessment praxis. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois and Indiana University, NILOA. Murillo F. J., Hidalgo N. (2017). Students’ conceptions about a fair assessment of their learning. Studies in Educational Evaluation, 53, 10-16. Nortvedt, G.A., Wiese, E., Brown, M. et al. (2020). Aiding culturally responsive assessment in schools in a globalising world. Educational Assessment, Evaluation and Accountability, 32, 5–27. Scott S., Webber C. F., Lupart J. L., Aitken N. and Scott D. E. (2014). Fair and equitable assessment practices for all students. Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy & Practice, 21,1, 52-70. Sen A. (1999). Development as freedom. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Stobart G. (2005). Fairness in multicultural assessment systems. Assessment in Education, 12, 3, 275–287. Swaffield S. & Williams M. (Eds.) (2008), Unlocking assessment: Understanding for reflection and application. London: David Fulton. Tierney R.D. (2014). Fairness as a multifaceted quality in classroom assessment. Studies in Educational Evaluation, 43, 55-69. Zhang, J., Takacs, S., Truong L., Smulders, D., Lee, H. (2021). Assessment Design: Perspectives and Examples Informed by Universal Design for Learning. Centre for Teaching, Learning, and Innovation. Justice Institute of British Columbia.