Our reading of the TEF submissions’ engagement with the concept of educational gain suggests that there is value for institutions in exploring how educational gain is conceptualised in their context, and how it might be measured or assessed.
The direction of travel, however, is towards institutions using the concept to enhance their own internal shared understanding of the educational endeavour, not towards the higher education sector collectively progressing towards an ever-more refined shared definition of the concept or analytical framework for assessing it.
If this is indeed the case, future iterations of the TEF should encourage assessment panels to make judgements about the quality of thinking and action going into mobilising educational gain to serve broader strategic ends, such as understanding the impact of different pedagogical approaches, or helping students make choices about their own approach to the university experience, rather than judgements about the extent of educational gain the institution is able to demonstrate in its students.
The TEF submissions do, however, offer a diverse range of approaches to assessing educational gain – and surfacing these can help the whole sector learn and reflect as thinking on the topic evolves.
