The oral examination is an important component of the high-stakes "O" Level examination in Singapore taken by 16-17 year olds whose first language may or may not be English. In spite of this, there has been sparse research into the examination. This paper reports findings of an exploratory study which attempted to determine whether there…

The training of raters for writing assessment through web-based programmes is emerging as an attractive and flexible alternative to the conventional method of face-to-face training sessions. Although some online training programmes have been developed, there is little published research on them. The current study aims to compare the effectiveness…

This article describes a study that emerged as a result of the severe acute respiratory syndrome crisis that struck Hong Kong in 2003. One outcome of the severe acute respiratory syndrome crisis was that all personnel in all educational institutions in Hong Kong were compelled to wear face masks for the period April-August 2003. Consequently, the…

Context: Various research studies have examined the question of whether expert or non-expert raters, faculty or students, evaluators or standardized patients, give more reliable and valid summative assessments of performance on Objective Structured Clinical Examinations (OSCEs). Less studied has been the question of whether or not non-faculty…