School-Based Assessment is the assessment conducted by the teachers in the schools they teach in. The subject teachers continue to assess their leaders throughout the session and thus teaching learning and assessment go hand in hand in an integrated manner. It is a learner-centric methodology and activity-based pedagogy. It is different from the traditional method of examinations and assessment. It is a repetitive method which continues throughout the session to narrow down all the learning gaps in the students.
In its wider sense, SBA includes assessment for learning, assessment as learning and assessment of learning. The main motive is what is called the all-around development of the learners in a more effective and efficacious manner. It assesses the learners both formally as well as informally. One of the basic features of SBA is that it leads to collaborative learning. It leads to more emphasis on understanding the concepts. The New Educational Policy 2020 also stresses the concept clarification of the learners.
School-Based Assessment does away with traditional and faulty methods like forcing the students to learn under the threat of examinations. It is not merely about labelling the learners and dividing them into Slow learners, bright students problem children etc. Its main aim would be to identify the learning gaps in conceptual understanding and employ sophisticated methods to narrow down those gaps. It inspires the learners to provide friendly feedback to enrich learning in a proper learning environment. The traditional method of assessment left all stress on the written examinations which only forced students to memorize too much even without bothering about the concept clarification. The experts later came to realise that this rote learning could not be beneficial to the students in the long run. SBA thus believes more in formative assessment which shall assess the basic learning of the students and their concept clarification in every subject, topic and lesson throughout the session. It shall be more beneficial, efficient and comprehensive in bringing real change in the teaching-learning process.
School-Based Assessment combines the main features of both formative and summative assessment properly. Although it gives more importance to formative assessment the features of summative assessment too are added to bring better results. It believes in classroom-based sessional assessments throughout the session to keep the students alert and active during the teaching-learning process. Formative assessment occurs during the learning process while summative assessment begins at the end of the process. Formative assessment allows the teachers and the learners to pivot the strategies midstream while summative assessment provides a final evaluation of knowledge and skills taught and learnt. Formative assessment identifies the areas of improvement while the summative assessment identifies the areas of concern. During the formative assessment, the students give their feedback while after the summative assessment, the students are provided with the grades.
Thus, by including both types of assessment properly we can witness a revolutionary change in the whole education system. If the teachers can learn and implement the SBA properly and wholeheartedly there can hardly be any doubt that skies would be our limits as far as our formal education system is concerned. It will certainly lead to learning which would be holistic, integrated, enjoyable and engaging for the learners.
The writer is a teacher in the Education Department and can be reached at [email protected]

Hilal Bukhari