Authentic Assessment

• Traditional assessment often emphasizes timed tests and recall (e.g., multiple-choice exams) or application of concepts or skills within the discrete context of a course or program (e.g., essay, problem set).
• Authentic assessment asks learners to apply knowledge, skills, and attitudes in relevant ways through complex tasks, especially those that simulate professional, civic, or real-world contexts.

• Motivation & engagement: meaningful tasks, learner agency
• Deeper learning: frame problems, evaluate evidence, reflect & iterate solutions
• Transferable soft skills: teamwork, resilience, cultural awareness
• Equity & accessibility: multi-modal formats support diverse learners
• Academic integrity: intrinsic value & format decrease outsourcing to GenAI

• Student-lead demo or discussion (Socratic seminar), interactive oral assessment.
• Policy forum, expert panel, 1-minute speech
• Debates, mock trial, oral exams.
• Embodied interpretation, dramatization

• Inquiry and problem-based learning, case studies
• Sketches, flowcharts, physical models, proposal, survey
• Role playing, mock historical simulation 
• Scenario completion, ethical dilemma game, escape room

• SWOT / gap analysis, forecast
• Book review, textbook selection critique
• Explainer video or podcast
• Infographic, public toolkit, fact sheet
• Digital or physical curated exhibit, interactive timeline

• Rubric, checklist for course assignment
• Exam question bank / short answer question
• Self-assessment, reflection
• Portfolio, professional statement

• Community/industry partner identified need
• Community-based research or action project 
• Collaboration with on-campus unit
• Student-identified need in community

• Untimed assessment: capturing learning over speed
• Multiple attempts: allowing for learning from mistakes
• Open book / collaborative exams: focusing on application & interpretation
• Two-stage exams: assessing individuals + learning from collaborative effort

While authentic assessments offer students the opportunity to apply their knowledge, skills, and attitudes in meaningful, relevant ways, it is important to highlight that authenticity is not universal, rather inherently situated.  

When designing authentic assessments, instructors often rely on assumptions grounded in their own expectations and understandings of what is meaningful and relevant, as well as notions of student neutrality. This can overshadow or even dismiss the diversity of students’ contexts, lived experiences, and goals, as well as narrow understandings of what counts as “authentic.” Authentic assessments can also unintentionally reinforce barriers to access.  

 To design authentic assessments that account for the diversity of authenticity, consider the following: 

Challenge Bias and Assumptions:  

• What defines “real world” and “authentic”?  

• Whose perspective is it?  

• What constitutes “meaningful” and for whom?  

• What knowledge, experiences, and identities are privileged? Excluded? 

• What hidden skills or traits are required to succeed (e.g. academic language, professional norms, confidence)? Who might need to do more work to meet these expectations? 

Co-Create the Learning Experience: 

• Engage students to understand their motivations, interests and goals, and identify opportunities to incorporate these aspects into the assessment’s design 

• Develop the assessment with students (e.g. topic of choice, co-designed criteria). 

Design for Equity and Access: 

• Build in flexibility to reduce the need for accommodations (e.g. formats, due dates) 

• Provide options for how students engage with and demonstrate their learning (e.g. format, audience) 

• Scaffold the assessment (e.g. practice, checkpoints, reflection, feedback) 

• Design criteria and rubrics that outline expectations and are aligned to learning outcomes to eliminate potential for rewarding bias (e.g. privileging personal qualities, assessment formats, communication styles)

To grade authentic assessments, we want to focus on a few key areas that challenge traditional ways of thinking about grading, while also considering alternative grading options. Here are three key considerations:  

• Shift language: Shift from a focus on letter grades or scores to focusing on what the student has learned. Use phrases like: “What did you learn?” Or “Try another way.”  

• Be transparent: The focus is on learning, so consider options that allow students to revise and resubmit work after receiving feedback from you or their peers.  

• Type of feedback: If we only score a rubric, will they understand what they are doing well or did they just check off the requirements in a box? Think of the best way to provide meaningful feedback on key components of the assessment. 

Source: “How to start reimaging assessments authentically”-Karen Bunch Franklin, Times Higher Education, 13 May 2026.