Taxation students’ perceptions of open-book assessment prior to the qualifying examination of South African chartered accountants

Abstract

In this study taxation students' perceptions of open-book assessment, prior to their exposure to open-book assessment in the qualifying examination of South African chartered accountants, is explored. A focus group was conducted using the Interactive Qualitative Analysis methodology. In this focus group, taxation students without prior exposure to open-book assessment identified their perception themes (also referred to as affinities) on open-book assessment. These affinities were grouped together and described by them as: good preparation, back-up, encouragement, general advantages, improved quality of answers, negative symptoms, negative environment, personal experience and hindrance, different approach and time management. The students then identified relationships between these different affinities. These relationships were summarized and reflected on a System Interrelationship Diagram, giving a visual map of the students' perceptions.Findings from the System Interrelationship Diagram indicated that students perceive good preparation as the strongest driver for successful completion of an open-book assessment. This System Interrelationship Diagram showed three primary outcomes namely negative symptoms, different approach and time management. This implies that students perceived that open-book assessment may create laziness (negative symptom) in students leading to a different approach when preparing for and completing such assessments. Finally, they concluded that successful completion of an open-book assessment necessitates proper time management.

Taxation students’ perceptions of open-book assessment: a follow-up interactive qualitative analysis

“…The earlier focus group study (Du Preez & Du Preez, 2012) identified a number of affinities, which can be defined as the themes generated in an IQA process by the focus group regarding perceptions of open-book assessment. Throughout the current article, brief references are made to this prior focus group study.…”

“…The classification of the affinities from the focus group study (Du Preez & Du Preez, 2012) is summarised as tentative SID assignments in Figure 1.…”

“…Once the definition for each affinity was finalised, a system influence diagram (SID) was compiled by the researchers for the relationships between the affinities indicated by the participants in the focus group (Du Preez & Du Preez, 2012). A SID represents the relationships between the different affinities in a system -affinities may influence each other, or they may in turn be influenced by other affinities.…”

“…different approach (the mental and emotional change in preparation necessitate adjustment when preparing for open-book assessment, compared with closed-book assessment); and . time management (the effective management of time when preparing for and during the assessment, as well as accepting that the tools available should be used only when absolutely necessary) (Du Preez & Du Preez, 2012).…”

“…Students' perceptions of a specific assessment type appear to influence their attitude towards both preparing for and taking the assessment (Du Preez & Du Preez, 2012;Struyven, Dochy, & Janssens, 2002) 1 . There also seems to be a link between a student's study profile, assessment preference and final achievement (Karagiannopoulou & Milienos, 2013).…”