Oral assessments, and assessed presentations

Oral assessments, including assessed presentations, are often a particular concern for students who stammer. However, there is support available. This page looks particularly at assessments in higher and further education, for example universities. However similar principles apply to assessments by trade/professional bodies and, from September 2007, general exam boards responsible for GCSEs and A-levels.

Introduction
Examples of how assessments can be altered
What are the DDA rules on oral assessments?

Introduction

Assessments are often designed in a way which unnecessarily disadvantages people who stammer. However, there are DDA rules to help disabled students, and your university or college should be happy to discuss with you what support you need.

For those who stammer, presentations and other oral assessments are often a particular problem. If you have concerns, you can speak to your personal tutor or course tutor to discuss what can be done to put you on a level playing field. Extra time is an obvious possibility, but there are many more examples below. You can also approach the university's disability officer. If you are not yet at the university and are concerned about assessments for admission, again you can raise your concerns with staff. There is more on these points in a very useful article: How to succeed at university if you stammer (link to BSA website).

The university or college may be obliged to take steps even without you raising the issue, if at least one of its staff knows of your stammer. The stammer will often be obvious. Even so, if you have concerns it makes sense to raise the issue yourself.

What steps can be taken will depend on the situation as well as what your needs are. If French oral skills are legitimately being assessed, a written test would not work but extra time might be allowed. Partly this is common sense, and you could just discuss with the university or college what can be done. However, under What are the DDA rules on oral assessments? below I try to summarise the relevant DDA rules.

Examination and assessment examples:
"The entrance requirements for a GCSE French course state that applicants 'must be able to speak clearly'. This requirement could unjustifiably exclude some people whose impairments result in a significant effect on their speech." Para 8.7

"A college sets applicants for a higher level language course a short oral exercise. A person with a speech impairment is given additional time to complete the exercise. This is likely to be a reasonable adjustment." Para 8.31

"A further education college confers its own qualifications for a course in travel and tourism. One of the criteria for passing the course is 'speaking clearly in a customer services environment'. A disabled student whose impairment affects her speech does not achieve the qualification because of this criterion. Applying this standard may be unlawful." Para 9.19.

From 2007 Code of Practice: Post-16 Education.

Examples of how assessments can be altered

Here are some ideas for changes that can be made to oral assessments and presentations. I don't distinguish here between 'reasonable adjustments' and the rules on competence standards.

extra time (this may not be enough though, as in the Calderdale Council case on employment, or a U.S. case, Hartman v National Board of Medical Examiners);
allow it to be done in writing (see written interviews in context of employment);
in a presentation, allow/encourage use of Powerpoint or other audiovisual aids, to take pressure off speech;
in a group presentation, divide the roles up so that the person who stammers (if he does not want to speak) prepares Powerpoint slides and other students actually speak;
have smaller audience for a presentation, or conduct it as small-group seminar round a table rather then as a full stand-up presentation;
remove fluency' or 'clarity of speech' from the assessment criteria;
consider ignoring over-use of terms such as 'you know' and 'in fact', which can be used by people who stammer to try and get through or disguise dysfluency;
use technology, such as text to speech software, or typing in text which appears on a large screen (see use of technology in context of employment interviews);
where there is a discussion, or questions and answers, consider allowing the student a period afterwards to write any points he could not say (and suggest that during the discussion the student make a note to remind him of anything he will want to add in writing);
in a United States case, a medical student in a clinical skills examination was allowed use of a text-to-speech device, double time for each patient encounter, and replacement of the telephone patient encounters with in-person encounters (Hartman v National Board of Medical Examiners: U.S. case).

There are more examples in De Montfort University's very useful Working with students who stammer (pdf, external link). Some of my examples on employment can be also adapted to assessments.

What are the DDA rules on oral assessments?

Those are some of the things that may help people who stammer. But what does the DDA actually require? Here I try to give a (relatively) untechnical summary.There is more detail on my Post-16 education page, including references to the Code of Practice.

Assessments test how far a person meets particular 'competence standards'. There are at least two DDA rules they must comply with:

the way in which a standard is assessed is subject to the duty to make reasonable adjustments; and
there is a special 'justification' test for whether it is legitimate to assess a standard which disadvantages disabled people.

Duty to make reasonable adjustments

The normal reasonable adjustment duty is, broadly, that if the way an assessment is done puts a person who stammers at a disadvantage, the university must take any reasonable steps so that he is not at a disadvantage (unless the disadvantage is only minor or trivial).

Medical exams

There is a United States case, Hartman v National Board of Medical Examiners (2010) in which a medical student was granted a preliminary injunction allowing him adjustments in a clinical skills exam, including use of a text-to-speech device, double time for each patient encounter, and replacement of the telephone patient encounters with in-person encounters. Indeed, the latter two adjustments had been agreed prior to the case.

This is not a UK case, but the test used seemed to be roughly similar to that in Great Britain for reasonable adjustments. Also, practice of non-UK bodies, as in this case, may be of some interest in addressing whether a UK competence standard inconsistent with such adjustments is justified as a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim.

However, the university or college only has to make adjustments which are consistent with what is being tested. So it may be reasonable to do an oral assessment in writing, but not if it is French oral skills that are being tested. It will very often be reasonable to allow extra time for the oral assessment.

Extra time may not be possible if it is actually the ability to do the oral task within that limited time that is being tested, but this will probably be rare. An example might be assessing a doctor's ability to deal with an emergency medical situation - but I don't know whether that is actually a competence standard which is assessed, and see box on right regarding medical exams.

Even in that rare situation of assessing oral ability within a limited time, it may be possible to argue that exams are an artificially stressful situation. The tribunal decision in Wakefield v Land Registry may be helpful; it found that where the stammer was a particular problem in job interviews, the interview was not a valid way to test how the individual would perform in the workplace. Also see this Ohio firefighter case, where speech was fine at a fire but not in interview.

Are competence standards 'justified'?

WARNING: The summary on competence standards below may well not be valid for the time being, because London Borough of Lewisham v Malcolm (June 2008) may apply to education and very substantially reduce protection.

That is not the end of the story though. Say it is oral skills (or the ability to do something orally within a limited time) that are being tested. If that leads to the student being treated less favourably for a reason related to his stammer, eg failing the assessment or getting a lower mark, then the university or college has to be able to justify the fact that it is assessing that competence standard. It has to show there was a good enough reason for assessing oral skills for example, or the time limit. If it cannot, the student is likely to have a DDA claim for disability-related discrimination. In some cases the university will be liable for direct discrimination for which there is no justification defence.

Let us say there is a good enough reason for assessing oral skills. Even so, some criteria being used to assess those skills may not be justified. For example, 'fluency' or 'clarity of speech' may be open to challenge if included in the assessment criteria.

What is a good enough reason for assessing a particular standard? The main legal test is whether the standard is a 'proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim'. There is more on what that means on my Post-16 education page.

In summary

A good first question to ask is what is being assessed. Is it oral skills, or is it the person's knowledge of the subject, or ability to learn?
If it is not oral skills being assessed, then as well as considering changes to the oral test itself, a written assessment might also be a reasonable adjustment.
If it is oral skills being tested, there is the question (under the rules for 'competence standards') whether there is a good enough reason for them to be tested in this context - and is it legitimate for eg 'fluency' or 'clarity of speech' to be included in the assessment criteria?
Assuming the oral competence standards are justified, reasonable adjustments to the oral assessment, eg extra time, should still be possible so far as they are consistent with whatever is being assessed.

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Oral assessments, and assessed presentations

Introduction

What are the DDA rules on oral assessments?

Duty to make reasonable adjustments

Medical exams

Are competence standards 'justified'?

In summary

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