Louise is a part-time DPhil Education student whose research focuses on issues of fairness and comparability in international summative assessments. She has worked in international educational assessment for over 14 years, and currently works in Assessment Research & Design at the International Baccalaureate (IB).
Publications
Louise Badham (2023). Statistically guided grading judgements: contextualisation or contamination? Oxford Review of Education, DOI: 10.1080/03054985.2023.2290640
(2022). Summative assessments in a multilingual context: What comparative judgment reveals about comparability across different languages in Literature, International Journal of Testing, DOI: 10.1080/15305058.2022.2149536
The Scottish Qualifications Authority have today released reports on stakeholders’ views of national assessments in Scotland, four of which were conducted in conjunction with the Oxford University Centre for Educational Assessment and Glasgow University.
Professor Jo-Anne Baird at the University of Oxford and one of the co-authors of the research, said: “Public confidence in national qualifications is incredibly important for learners.
“Our findings show that people want a qualification system that fits modern Scottish society – one that is learner-focused, with choice, flexibility, and the capacity to adapt to the needs of learners with different skills and in a range of contexts.”
The research has been published on SQA’s website to support discussion around the future of assessment in Scotland.
See the article on our findings in the TES magazine.
Pok Jing (Jane) Ho is a doctoral student at the Department of Education, specialising in educational assessment.
She is funded by the Bei Shan Tang Foundation Scholarship for Graduate Studies.
Jane’s research explores validity evidence for the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education Examination (HKDSE) as well as how the validation efforts have been communicated and perceived by test users. Her work uses primarily qualitative methods.
Prior to joining OUCEA, Jane completed her MA in International Education Policy Analysis at Stanford University following a four-year stint as a secondary school teacher. She also worked as a project officer at the Education University of Hong Kong, where she is now serving as a consultant alongside her studies.
She is a Peer Supporter at Green Templeton College.
TITLE OF THESIS
Validity and validation: the case of the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education Examination
Publications
Ho, P. J. (2022). Assessing the range of cognitive processes in the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education Examination (HKDSE)’s English language reading literacy test. Language Testing in Asia, 12(18), 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40468-022-00167-4
Ho, P. J. (2020). For Some or for All: Vocational English for Hong Kong Secondary School Students. In C. Hong, & W. K. Ma (Eds.), Applied Degree Education and the Future of Work—Education 4.0 (pp. 87–95). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-3142-2
Ho, P. J. (2015). China-Africa “cooperation” in education. International Politics, 5. https://www.iir.cz/en/china-africa-cooperation-in-education
Margo is a DPhil student in the Department of Education. Her research interests focus on professional and vocational education as well as social mobility and social inclusivity in the context of higher education.
Margo’s DPhil research aims to examine Master of Business Administration (MBAs) programs as a means of human capital acquisition, and potential links between generation of this type of capital and social mobility for MBA students. She wants to explore to what extent generation of human capital can lead to social movements for MBA participants, and how this may be impacted by various social inclusion and meritocratic factors.
Prior to her DPhil studies at Oxford, Margo received a first class Master’s degree (with honours) in Financial Management at the University of Warsaw, completed PGCE in Business Education at University College London, and a Master’s degree in Educational Assessment at the University of Oxford. She also spent 15 years working in investment banking where alongside her M&A work, she developed interests in professional education, on-the-job learning, and coaching.
Jamie is a first-year DPhil candidate in Education, funded by an ESRC Grand Union DTP studentship.
Jamie’s research is using data from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) to explore how item difficulty estimates can be predicted by their mathematical content, the higher-level reasoning processes required by the item, as well as by linguistic factors. His work is making use of Rasch-based modelling techniques.
Prior to joining OUCEA, Jamie completed his undergraduate degree in Experimental Psychology, and his MSc in Education, both at the University of Oxford. He also has worked in primary and secondary schools in Oxford, in both teaching and assessment-based roles. Since joining OUCEA, Jamie has worked as a research assistant on a variety of projects, most notably as a co-author of England’s PIRLS 2016 report, and currently on OUCEA’s delivery of both PIRLS 2021 and PISA 2022. He has also taught on the MSc in Educational Assessment, and worked as the editorial officer for the journal Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy and Practice.
Title of Thesis
Psychometric modelling of item difficulty in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study
Publications
Stiff, J., Lenkeit, J., Hopfenbeck, T.N., Kayton, H. and McGrane, J.A. (2023) Research engagement in the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study: A systematic review. Educational Research Review, 40. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.edurev.2023.100547
McGrane, J., Stiff, J., Baird, J., Lenkeit, J., & Hopfenbeck, T. (2017). Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS): National report for England. London: Department for Education.
Double, K.S., McGrane, J.A., Stiff, J.C., & Hopfenbeck, T.N. (2019). The importance of early phonics improvements for predicting later reading comprehension. British Educational Research Journal, 45,6, p.1220-1234: https://doi.org/10.1002/berj.3559
Marja’s research to date has focused on female leaders in education.
Her doctoral research focuses on OECD countries with a strong educational system as according to the programme for international student assessment (PISA).
Marja works as a Deputy Head at Tallinn English College and a visiting lecturer at Tallinn University in Estonia. She holds an MA in Education Management and a BA in Psychology.
Yuanyue Hao obtained his BA degree in English (TESOL) in East China Normal University and MA degree in applied linguistics in Fudan University. Prior to his DPhil study, he taught TOEFL writing and EAP listening for Chinese learners of English.
Yuanyue’s doctoral research focuses on the development and validation of a scoring rubric to assess prosody in second language English read speech by Chinese learners of English, with the aim to inform classroom-based teaching and assessment as well as automatic pronunciation assessment. He is interested in using a combination of research methods, including systematic review and comparative judgement to inform the design of the scoring rubric, and many-facet Rasch model and machine learning algorithms (such as decision tree and kernel methods) to validate the rubric.
Yuanyue’s doctoral research focuses on the development and validation of a scoring rubric to assess prosody in second language English read speech by Chinese learners of English, with the aim to inform classroom-based teaching and assessment as well as automatic pronunciation assessment. He is interested in using a combination of research methods, including systematic review and comparative judgement to inform the design of the scoring rubric, and many-facet Rasch model and machine learning algorithms (such as decision tree and kernel methods) to validate the rubric.
TITLE OF THESIS
Assessing prosodic features in second language English speech by Chinese adult learners of English