28 February 2022

The Chartered Institute of Educational Assessors are pleased to be working with NAHT to encourage every school to have a Lead Assessor.

The CIEA Lead Assessor Support Programme

Despite the centrality of educational assessment to the teaching and learning process and its use in high-stakes assessments, there has been limited professional development opportunities for teachers to enhance their skills in assessment and collaborate with others.

The Chartered Institute of Educational Assessors are pleased to be working with NAHT to encourage every school to have a Lead Assessor.

Having an independently accredited Lead Assessor demonstrates a school or MAT’s clear commitment to high quality assessment practice and the professional development and support of its staff.

The Lead Assessor Support Programme is designed to enable Lead Assessors to ensure the development of high-quality educational assessment practice in their school/MAT by:

improving the validity and reliability of school-based assessment;

  • enhancing teaching and learning, delivering tangible benefits for all pupils across the institution(s);
  • raising the professional status of teachers by demonstrating their knowledge and understanding of effective educational assessment practice to governors, parents, Ofsted, and the wider community;
  • quality assuring the school curriculum and providing insight into the content, quality and ways in which progression is achieved in the curriculum;
  • reducing workload by ensuring that valid and reliable processes are used to measure and record pupils’ attainment.

The Lead Assessor Support Programme is intended to support senior teachers to lead the assessment processes and practices in their school. Whilst this programme can be offered to individual teachers, it is beneficial and has greater impact if more than one teacher from a school / MAT undertake the course together. This provides an opportunity for colleagues to discuss and audit the assessment processes in their own setting and cascading high quality practice in educational assessment with a view to making positive change in their department, whole school or across the MAT.