Assessment Standards Manager

Job Title: Assessment Standards Manager

Salary: £42,000 - £56,800

Location: Cambridge / Coventry / Hybrid working

Contract: Permanent, 35 hours per week

We are looking for an Assessment Standards Manager to join our friendly and high-performing team to play a key role in assuring appropriate standards for assessment processes and qualifications throughout the assessment cycle in line with regulatory requirements.

We are Cambridge University Press & Assessment, a world-leading academic publisher and assessment organisation and a proud part of the University of Cambridge.

About the role

You will look after a designated portfolio where you will be responsible for managing all aspects of the assessment cycle for your portfolio relating to quality, including the setting of assessments, standardising assessors and setting grade boundaries. You will ensure that qualification outcomes are fair, consistent, and maintain OCR's credibility. 

This role requires the ability to engage and build strong collaborative relationships with Assessment Specialists and with internal stakeholders across OCR and Cambridge University Press & Assessment.

This is a busy and stimulating role at all times, but the workload is particularly demanding during major examination and awarding periods as relevant to the qualifications in your portfolio. This includes mid-May to July and January/February & November.

During all of the above and occasionally at other times, some weekend and evening working may be required. During the examination and awarding periods for your portfolio it is possible that leave will not be available to the job holder.

Other key aspects of the role include:

• Provide clear direction and leadership to ensure assessment processes are conducted in line with OCR and regulatory requirements. Respond to regulatory drivers and innovations.
• Recruit and manage the performance of senior assessors in delivering their accountabilities.
• Conduct reviews of assessment materials and qualifications and once approved, implement recommendations.
• Provide assessment expertise to the development and piloting of new qualifications.
• Intervene as necessary in standardisation, marking, and marking review activities to ensure quality of assessment is maintained.
• Represent OCR's assessment(s) at external fora and events (e.g. regulatory, cross-board).
• Actively contribute to improvements to various aspects of delivery (e.g. accessibility of materials, internal processes).
• QA assessment materials to ensure they are fit for purpose, align with the assessment strategy and are error free.

About you

Competent in basic statistical analyses you will also have strong IT skills. Able to display an understanding of assessment principles and methodologies in relation to general and vocational/occupational qualifications, you will also have an awareness of the strategies and methods employed to maintain standards in qualifications.

To be successful in this role we are looking for someone with strong interpersonal skills and an appreciation of the challenges of producing and running both general and vocational qualifications. 

The behaviours you demonstrate are equally as important as your knowledge and experience. We expect our new colleagues to be open to new ideas and new approaches and be able to receive feedback from colleagues or their manager to improve their own performance. Open to learning from your own and others' experience, you will be supportive of other team members who are under pressure.  Flexible and willing to help out to get the job done, you will be able to form effective collaborative relationships with colleagues and other departments in OCR and Cambridge University Press &Assessment.

We welcome applications from those with any subject background.

Rewards and benefits

We will support you to be at your best in work and to live well outside of it. In addition to competitive salaries, we offer a world-class, flexible rewards package, featuring family-friendly and planet-friendly benefits including:

• 28 days annual leave plus bank holidays
• Private medical and Permanent Health Insurance
• Discretionary annual bonus
• Group personal pension scheme
• Life assurance up to 4 x annual salary
• Green travel schemes

We are a hybrid working organisation, and we offer a range of flexible working options from day one. We expect most hybrid-working colleagues to spend 40-60% of their time at their dedicated office or location. We will also consider other work arrangements if you wish to work more flexibly or require adjustments due to a disability.

Ready to pursue your potential? Apply now.

We review applications on an ongoing basis, and if we have identified enough suitable candidates we reserve the right to close the vacancy early. The closing date for all applications is Sunday 16^th June. Interviews are scheduled to take place from 24^th June 2024.

Please note that successful applicants will be subject to satisfactory background checks including DBS due to working in a regulated industry.

Please note, Cambridge University Press & Assessment is unable to sponsor this role under the Skilled Worker Visa route as it does not meet the minimum skill requirements.

Why join us

Joining us is your opportunity to pursue potential. You'll belong to a collaborative team that's exploring new and better ways to serve students, teachers and researchers across the globe – for the benefit of individuals, society and the world. Sharing our mission will inspire your own growth, development and progress, in an environment which embraces difference, change and aspiration.

Cambridge University Press & Assessment is committed to being a place where anyone can enjoy a successful career, where it's safe to speak up, and where we learn continuously to improve together. We welcome applications from all candidates, regardless of demographic characteristics (age, disability, educational attainment, ethnicity, gender, marital status, neurodiversity, religion, sex, gender identity and sexual identity), cultural, or social class/background.

We believe better outcomes come through diversity of thought, background and approach. We welcome applications from people from all backgrounds and communities, actively seeking to employ people from a wide range of different communities.

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