In 2017, the School of Medicine (Fremantle) of the University of Notre Dame Australia began moving towards programmatic assessment. Programmatic assessment seeks to achieve robust assessment validity through the assessment of a large number of low-stakes activities or data points. These data points exemplify assessment as learning by valuing feedback, discussion and reflection, ultimately leading to deeper student engagement without compromising credible decision-making on student progress. The School adopted an incremental approach to implementing programmatic assessment that included first establishing data-informed mentoring, and then activating a continuous assessment program that contributed simultaneously to student learning and School decision-making. Action research helped understand the impact of the initiative. Re-engineering continuous assessment as an incremental step towards programmatic assessment proved to be problematic. Some ideas are proposed to draw the strands of programmatic assessment together that may be useful for others to chart a more fruitful path.

This article examines the claim that, by the late 1980s, the Welsh Office possessed sufficient autonomy to implement policies that diverged from those of the functional Whitehall ministries. Two case studies, housing and education, are examined as these are areas where institutional autonomy and distinctive needs might be expected to be most apparent in Wales. The conclusion of this article is that the claims of Welsh exceptionalism (certainly in terms of policies) have been much exaggerated and that the ‘centre’, Westminster and Whitehall, was able to impose its preferred policies in Wales, whatever appearances to the contrary.

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The Constitution UnitUniversity College London, 1996. 120 pp. £10 This report is one of three reports published simultaneously by the Constitution Unit in 1996 on devolution in Scotland, Wales, and, in this case, Regional Government in England. Indicative of the comparatively weak debate on devolution within England to date this is the briefest of the three reports and much of the discussion is deliberately tentative and even exploratory. Basic questions such as the boundaries of regions, the powers of regions, whether regional representatives should be directly or indirectly elected are raised, outlined but not fully answered (though that is not the aim of this report it has to be said). The report's approach to several questions, even the most fundamental ones at the heart of the Constitution Unit's work, namely how can progress towards devolution to the English regions be best achieved by a progressive government is answered by suggesting several different models and discussing the merits and demerits of each. This report poses many of the questions that need to be asked about devolution in England but does not provide the answers. Having said that, especially in its chapter on regional government in Europe it provides much information that should improve the quality of debate on what regional assemblies can do, what powers they should have and what relationships they ought to have with central governments. The final point it makes on devolution to the English regions is perhaps the most pertinent of all. Whether the English devolution debate will take place, whether it will take place at a high level intellectually and what will be the outcome of that debate if it takes place is a matter of political will and needs a powerful political champion to push it forward. It is too early to say if John Prescott can play that role within the Labour government.

After the devolution débâcle of the 1970s it seemed that Welsh politics was finished, a subject for a historian's curiosity but nothing more. With the electorate's approval of devolution in a referendum in 1997, interest in Welsh politics has revived. This article reviews recent publications on the road to the referendum, the referendum itself and prospects for the new National Assembly for Wales. Signs of a nascent civil society in Wales are detected but a more sophisticated and critical attitude to writing about Welsh politics is necessary to foster a mature civil society.