Developed as a means of fostering a skills-oriented teaching and learning environment, this authentic assessment maps onto the practice of ministerial briefing. This assessment is designed to make explicit the relationship between course content and professional practice. This Ministerial Policy Recommendation sees students choose a contemporary (foreign or domestic) policy issue and write a two page ministerial recommendation or briefing. Students are marked on their ability to demonstrate a complex understanding of the contemporary implications and debates related to particular policy areas and to articulate a strong, succinct and coherent case for policy change. In their ministerial briefing, students may be required to (1) outline the current policy and its rationale, (2) clearly outline and rationalise the recommended policy change (3) provide details of relevant stakeholders and their likely reactions to the recommendation, (4) outline the (foreign and/or domestic) implication of the recommendation. In the case of POLS220,1 students must choose a key policy issue in the jurisdiction of the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and recommend a policy change to the Minister on that issue. However, this technique could be easily appropriated to any discipline that deals in policy (particularly Education, Social Science).
Details
- CLASS SIZE
- 100-500
- CLASS LEVEL
- Second year, Third year
- ASSESSMENT SECURITY
- Medium security
- TIME REQUIREMENTS
- Medium time
- GRADUATE ATTRIBUTES
- In-depth knowledge in the field(s) studied, Critical judgement
- CONDITIONS
- Work-related
- FEATURES
- Authentic, Online
- TAGS
- policy document, applied writing
Advantages
This skills-focused assessment enhances student employability by encouraging the application of theory beyond the classroom, as well as developing discipline specific skills in policy that many employers are seeking. By engaging with this assessment, students develop vocationally specific forms of written communication skills beyond those acquired through engagement with more traditional academic forms of written assessment such as a research essay. This assessment is well suited to the HaSS disciplines of Governance and Public Policy, International Relations, Social and Public Policy, or any other disciplines in which students are likely to enter public, government sectors or graduate programs.
Challenges
Staff may be required to invest additional time in ensuring that students understand what may be an unfamiliar task. It helps to provide students with clear explanations and examples of the task through exemplars as well as a dedicated discussion of the marking criteria.
Tips for implementation
As this is an authentic, industry-focused assessment, course staff may find it useful to liaise with an industry stakeholder who has the relevant industry experience in the type of policy area/s being addressed
Learning outcomes
1. demonstrate knowledge of contemporary Australian foreign policy.
3. evaluate the effectiveness of Australian foreign policy practices and strategies
4. apply knowledge of foreign policy issues to current events.
How it supports academic integrity
This assessment requires that students choose a contemporary and distinct policy issue and critique it in concert with the course content. This level of specificity may serve to prevent misconduct such as plagiarism, and will allow outsourced material to be readily identified (where in-class attendance is central to a thorough comprehension of threshold concepts). The specific format of the brief, following a distinct template students are required to adhere to, also makes the assessment more challenging to generate through AI.
Associate Professor Matt McDonald
matt.mcdonald@uq.edu.au
Matt McDonald joined the School of Political Science and International Studies in January 2010, and is the current Director of Teaching and Learning in the School. After completing his PhD at UQ in 2003, Matt held lectureship posts in international relations at the University of New South Wales and the University of Birmingham (UK), and was Associate Professor in International Security at the University of Warwick (UK). His research focuses on critical theoretical approaches to security and their application to issues such as environmental change, Australian foreign and security policy, climate politics and Asia-Pacific security dynamics. He has published on these themes in a range of journals and is the author of Ecological Security: Climate Change and the Construction of Security (Cambridge UP, 2021);, Security, the Environment and Emancipation (Routledge 2012); and (with Anthony Burke and Katrina Lee-Koo) Ethics and Global Security (Routledge 2014). He was formerly co-editor of Australian Journal of Politics and History. He is currently completing an ARC-funded project on comparative national approaches to the climate change- security relationship. Find out more