Hi Pat, first of all, thank you for your appreciations.
I will try to make it as structured as you did… so:
First – you’re asking some of the deepest secrets! Well… we try all times to find something new, to encourage trainees to find themselves challenging questions or problems, to find different approaches for the compulsory curricula. For observers one might not find things challenging but we have a very similar approach as for the forecasters: we’re using their errors, and also their experiences. We also have some “dry” topics as coding or rules and regulations… for these the challenge is to find the logic, the need and implications. Most of them are also based on sharing experiences. But everything, without the imagination and dedication of the trainers designing the course might be nothing.
Well, for the rest of the aspects you highlighted, the problems are quite sensible… we just started to use the moodle platform for quizzes and short tests. Our big problem is that we need some more authentic online structures for assessment. We have to develop these but it takes a lot of time. For this objective I strongly believe that open source templates (maybe developed as cooperation between states) that can be tailored for national use might be the solution. That was the reason why I suggested that COMET and EUMETCAL as leader organizations might develop or help developing some templates for international use.
In Romania as in many other non-english speaking countries the use of those modules is somewhat limited because of the language at least. But, as you once said, some of the COMET modules might be translated in some other languages being a sort of open in this aspect.
As I’ve tried to explain a bit in-depth in the other topic, each AMP has his personal file which describes the identified strengths and weaknesses. The problem is to have a sort of evolution traceability… the problem is extremely complex, and the aspects you’ve raised still have to be considered and solved.
For the very beginning we’re using in the moodle some random multiple question tests and quizzes – just to make AMP’s used with the platform. We’re hoping that in the next year we’ll develop a test simulation as flexible as possible.
Regarding the tailored assessments… this is also delicate – we always prefer to check some basic knowledge and the way AMP’s apply, instead of supposing that someone that once proved he knows something knows that thing forever. We’re human – so we forget! So, we check periodically some aspects that are connected to the basic competencies for the job.
We’re trying to have our AMP’s not only highly qualified, but also highly competent for their jobs. We can’t afford to suppose anything, we have to make them prove everything. The mini-assessments you’ve mentioned are, of course, part of the image we have about the competences and are extremely important for us in order to fill the gaps. For the external assessment, the final examination, based on probing, can’t take into account all the fine tuning we have to do.
Thanks again for all the ideas you gave me/us!