ContextOptimising student learning and academic performance is a continuous challenge for medical schools. The assessment policy may influence both learning and performance. Previously, the joint contribution of self‐regulated learning (SRL) and participation in scheduled learning activities towards academic performance has been reported. However, little is known about the relationships between SRL, participation and academic performance under different assessment policies.ObjectivesThe goal of this study was to investigate differences in average scores of SRL, participation and academic performance of students under two assessment policies: (i) a conjunctive lower stakes, lower performance standard (old) assessment policy and (ii) a compensatory higher stakes, higher performance standard (new) assessment policy. In addition, this research investigated whether the relationships between academic performance, SRL and participation are similar across both assessment policies.MethodsYear‐1 medical students (i) under the old assessment policy (n = 648) and (ii) under the new assessment policy (n = 529) completed the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire on SRL, and additional items on participation. Year‐1 performance was operationalised as students’ average Year‐1 course examination grades. manova and structural equation modelling were used for analyses.ResultsGenerally, students under the new assessment policy showed significantly higher Year‐1 performance, SRL and participation, compared with students under the old assessment policy. The relationships between Year‐1 performance, SRL and participation were similar across assessment policies.ConclusionsThis study indicates that the higher academic performance under a compensatory higher stakes, higher performance standard assessment policy, results from higher SRL and participation, but not from altered relationships between SRL, participation and performance. In sum, assessment policies have the potential to optimise student learning and performance.

Despite the frequently reported association of characteristics of assessment policies with academic performance, the mechanisms through which these policies affect performance are largely unknown. Therefore, the current research investigated performance, motivation and self-regulation for two groups of students following the same statistics course, but under two assessment policies: education and child studies (ECS) students studied under an assessment policy with relatively higher stakes, a higher performance standard and a lower resit standard, compared with Psychology students. Results show similar initial performance, but more use of resits and higher final performance (post-resit) under the ECS policy compared with the psychology policy. In terms of motivation and self-regulation, under the ECS policy significantly higher minimum grade goals, performance self-efficacy, task value, time and study environment management, and test anxiety were observed, but there were no significant differences in aimed grade goals, academic self-efficacy and effort regulation. The relations of motivational and selfregulatory factors with academic performance were similar between both assessment policies. Thus, educators should be keenly aware of how characteristics of assessment policies are related to students' motivation, self-regulation and academic performance.

In this article, we present a curricular perspective that can be used to understand students’ focus on assessment in higher education. We propose that the degree of alignment between the objectives and assessment of the curriculum plays a crucial role in students’ motivation. In case of perfect alignment, all objectives have an equitable probability of being assessed. Thus, all learning contributes to performance equitably. Consequently, the motivation to perform and the motivation to learn should result in the same learning behaviour and performance. However, in reality, a certain degree of cognitive and operant misalignment of the assessment with the objectives is present. Hence, some objectives will not need to be mastered in order to pass certain assessments. Consequently, a distinction arises between assessed and unassessed learning, and only the assessed learning contributes to performance. Thus, the probability of performing well on assessments is higher when students focus their effort on the assessed learning only, instead of dividing their effort between the assessed and unassessed learning. Therefore, students who are motivated to perform have a motivation that fits in a misaligned curriculum. The article concludes with implications of this curricular fit perspective for assessment practices, as well as for motivational research.

Despite the benefits swift academic progress holds for many stakeholders, there is scarce literature on how academic progress may be improved by changes to assessment policies. Therefore, we investigated academic progress of first-year students after an alteration of characteristics of the assessment policies in three large course programmes: business administration (n ¼ 2048) changed the stakes; medicine (n ¼ 1630) changed the stakes and performance standard; psychology (n ¼ 1076) changed the stakes, performance standard and resit standard. Results indicate that students' academic progress was sensitive to the characteristics of the assessment policy in all three course programmes. The changes in progress could be explained by differences in performance, as well as by differences in selection for progress by the different policies. Implications are that assessment policies seem effective in shaping student progress, although one size does not fit all.