School and Network Partnerships
The University of Melbourne supports educators to confidently teach, assess, report on and credential the complex competencies learners need to thrive at school and beyond.
The University works with innovative schools in two types of engagements:
The Melbourne Assessment Community (MAC)
- A University service that provides schools with the professional learning, events, teacher and leader resources, and online assessment and reporting tools required to teach, assess and report on a range of complex competencies in their learners
- All schools, national and international, are invited to join the community
Research-practice partnerships
- Collaborative research projects that lead innovation and development in the assessment and credentialing of complex competencies
- Invitation only. Read more about our research projects, such as New Metrics, the International Big Picture Learning Credential, and the Australian Learner Competency Credential.
Within these engagements, networks and schools work with experts at Melbourne Metrics to access University technology to:
- use new and validated assessment tools as a lever for transformational change; measuring what is valued, so that what is valued can be learned
- generate reports and credentials that recognise a broader range of what a learner knows and can do
- influence the development of new policy
- garner the necessary support to facilitate real change in schools
- connect with national and international networks of like-minded educators
Next-generation assessments will support your school to:
- Build expertise. Develop the capacity of staff to lead the assessment and recognition of learner’s competencies
- Determine learning ambitions. What complex competencies do you intend to develop in your learners?
- Design learning and assessment. Quality learning design provides learners with opportunities to learn, exercise and demonstrate complex competencies.
- Make judgements. Use the University’s Ruby assessment platform to make judgements about learning.
More than a mark: how to measure learning success without ranks and tests
Professor Sandra Milligan explains new ways of assessing and credentialing, along with what they mean for learners, their teachers, employers and teritary selectors in her 2022 Dean’s Lecture. Professor Milligan pays homage to schools working in partnership with the University to tackle a big challenge facing Australian schooling.
All schools come to this work from different starting points. Some have worked for years to have a learning design that embeds the teaching and practice of complex competencies. Others are just starting out.
For all, the common missing pieces are:
- a standards-based set of assessment tools that are robust, reliable, transferable, comparable, and context-agnostic
- a recognition system that values a broad range of learning
- resources to support teacher planning
- professional learning for teachers and leaders
- connecting with a community of like-minded innovators
Melbourne Assessment Community: What is possible on the journey
Schools committed to using assessment and recognition to support transformation of learning in their settings will go on a journey of typically two to three years.
- Step 1
-
Join us. Partner with Melbourne Metrics.
- Step 2
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Engage in Professional Learning. Build leader and teacher capacity to use new metrics for learning.
- Step 3
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Determine Learning Ambitions. What competencies do you want your learners to develop?
- Step 4
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Conduct Formative Assessments. Teachers assess learners and generate ‘rocket’ competency reports that support their planning.
- Step 5
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Generate School Reporting. Teacher assessments are aggregated to produce yearly or semesterly reports for learners and families.
- Step 6
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Warranting & Moderation. Melbourne Metrics conducts an audit to support and verify a school’s assessment procedures.
- Step 7
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Produce Credentials. Learners attain warranted University of Melbourne credentials that recognise a broad range of their competencies.
Members of the Melbourne Assessment Community are invited to draw from numerous resources to support their journey to assess and report on a range of complex competencies. Key features include:
- Ruby, the University of Melbourne’s online assessment platform
- Teacher and Leader competency kits
- Online professional learning modules
- Events designed to scaffold each school’s journey
All staff from member schools have access to these features and more on the Melbourne Assessment Community portal.
Ruby
To support teachers' judgments of learners' complex competencies, teachers can access the University's online assessment platform, Ruby.
Teachers can learn what to expect from Ruby by trying out a Year 5 - Year 8 sample assessment. This sample assessment allows teachers to assess students for Agency in Learning and generate a Rocket competency report.
Teacher and Leader Kits
Competency kits have been developed to support teachers to plan for the teaching and assessment of a range of complex competencies.
Each kit provides:
- a conceptual framework of the competence; the ‘building blocks’ to consider when planning
- learning progressions for a range of ages/stages, to support teachers to know how what the development of competence looks like
- advice for planning assessment opportunities; the kinds of performances, tasks and activities that support learners to demonstrate competence
Professional learning
The University has designed a series of ten online professional learning modules to support teachers and leaders.
Measuring What Matters shares the first three modules for free. The University welcomes interested educators to use and share these resources.
Transforming Assessment Design is a seven-module course for leaders and aspiring leaders to learn how to lead the assessment and recognition of complex competencies. Partner schools receive fully subsidised enrolments in this course.
A community
Leaders from partner schools commit to attending three online seminars per year, accessed via the partner portal. These events:
- Provide support to school leaders
- Scaffold schools through different parts of the learning journey
- Allow the University to convene guest presenters and share insights into related policy developments
In addition, partners can attend optional touch-base sessions (to share opportunities or problems of practice) and will receive invitations to other events offered by Melbourne Metrics and the Faculty of Education.
The University of Melbourne warmly invites networks and schools to join the Melbourne Assessment Community.
Partnership opportunities include:
-
Option 1- LEARN
- Online professional learning modules to build your capacity as a leader of the assessment and recognition of complex competencies
- For individual educators
- $330 per person
-
Option 2- ASSESS & REPORT
- A scaffolded two-year journey to: build team capacity; align learning ambitions, learning design and assessment design; and generate formative and summative reports of learners’ complex competencies.
- For networks and schools
- A$8,000 p/a
-
Option 3- CREDENTIAL
- Credential learning attainment with warranted certification. With this end in mind, commit to a two-year journey that supports teams to plan for, teach, assess and credential complex competencies.
- For networks and schools
- A$14,000 p/a
Partnership option features
LEARN | ASSESS & REPORT | CREDENTIAL | |
---|---|---|---|
Individual educator | Network/ School | Network/ School | |
PROFESSIONAL LEARNING | |||
Enrolment in online professional learning course, ‘Measuring what matters’ | ✓ | Unlimited | Unlimited |
Enrolment in online leadership development course, ‘Transforming assessment design’ | 1 | 2 staff members | 2 staff members |
Access to Melbourne Metrics research and industry reports | ✓ | ✓ | |
Invitations to Melbourne Metrics webinars and events | ✓ | ✓ | |
Guidance to scaffold school journey | ✓ | ✓ | |
ASSESSMENT RESOURCES | |||
Whole-staff access to Melbourne Metrics partner portal | ✓ | ✓ | |
‘How to Assess...’ Competency kits for teachers | Limited | ✓ | ✓ |
Use of online assessment platform, Ruby | Limited | ✓ | ✓ |
Melbourne Metrics helpdesk technical support | ✓ | ✓ | |
Use of student self-assessment tools | ✓ | ✓ | |
Analytics-based alerts for quality assurance | ✓ | ||
REPORTING | |||
Auto-generated formative 'rocket' competency reports (for teaching planing) | ✓ | ✓ | |
Aggregated summative 'fan' competency profiles (for school reporting, e.g., end of semester reports to families) | ✓ | ✓ | |
UoM-led school audit | ✓ | ||
Moderation guidance | ✓ | ||
Benchmarking data | ✓ | ||
UoM quality assurance and warranting report (school-level) | ✓ | ||
UoM warranted credential per learner | $60 | ||
ANNUAL FEE (plus GST or any applicable taxes) | A$330 per person | A$8,000 | A$14,000 (+credentials, A$60 per credential, per learner) |
Meeting your needs
Speaking with us about customising the work for your network or school.
Additions:
- Production of bespoke assessment frameworks.
- Customised professional learning, with additional online or face-to-face engagements.
- Translation and/or validation for other educational contexts (e.g., international).
- UoM-led school audit (for ASSESS & REPORT partnership).
- Network project management support.
Reporting:
- Co-branded reports and credentials.
- Additional or customised student registration fields to be collected and shown on reports.
- Additional reporting, including more frequent reporting to the system or network, or customised reporting with additional detail.
Technology:
- Co-branded network portal and online assessment platform.
- Data services, including provision of data files and exports, data integration with other support services or systems, and data merging or integration.
- Customised server hosting arrangements.
- Tailored access management, including integration with enterprise solutions or additional third-party services.
The University of Melbourne is privileged to work alongside our school partners. These forward-thinking partners are leading educational transformation at a national and international level.
New Metrics partner schools
Melbourne Assessment Community partner schools
Melbourne Assessment Community portal
For existing Melbourne Assessment Community schools
Access the Community's online resources and events
Launch member-only community portal
Please note: For issues relating to the community portal, please get in touch with MAC support.
New Metrics portal
For existing New Metrics schools
Access New Metrics online resources and events
Please note: For issues relating to the New Metrics portal, please get in touch with New Metrics support.