2021 Board Nominations

The e-Assessment Association is a not-for-profit membership organisation governed voluntarily by a Board made up of both Corporate and Ordinary Members.

We currently have 4 positions available for Corporate Members and have received 7 nominations.

Corporate Members are drawn from the eAA's sponsors who support the work of the association through financial sponsorship. All our members will be invited to vote for 4 nominees from this group.

We currently have 4 positions available for Ordinary Members and have received 6 nominations.

Ordinary Members are drawn from the eAA's individual membership. All our members will be invited to vote for 4 nominees from this group, in addition to the 4 nominees from the above group.

Please read the following mini-biographies for each of the nominees.

Please note that details on how to vote are sent out to members separately, and one must be a member in order to vote.

If you are a member of the e-Assessment Association and have not received a link to the voting process, please email s[email protected] before 5pm GMT on Monday 27th September.

Voting closes at midnight (GMT) on Monday 27th September 2021

The nominees for the four Corporate Board Positions

Mark Ashton

AlphaPlus Consultancy

Mark Ashton. AlphaPlus Consultancy

As someone who has recently left higher education, I appreciate how much e-assessments can change a learner's experience. I have seen the impact technology can have on education and learning, and I believe that technology and e-assessments should play a more significant part than they currently are. With a fresh and open mind, I am eager to help implement a move from traditional assessments to e-assessments. I am also fortunate in that I will be able to work on the UK’s largest e-assessment contract, which is a bold step forward in assessments.

I advocate for better education for all and believe that e-assessments are the way forward in providing every child with the best possible start in life. I will strive to do all I can to push for more e-assessments to give a fair and equal chance to every child whilst aiming to reduce the educational disadvantage and attainment gap through adaptive assessment technology. We owe it to future generations to provide them equal and fair opportunities to succeed. They should have the best we can offer now so they can offer their best in the future. Help me change their future.

Profile

Emma Hall

BTL

Emma Hall. BTL

Emma has over 9 years of experience in the e-assessment industry. During that time Emma has worked closely with a diverse range of assessment organisations to help them explore how they can make the best use of technology, whilst understanding and tackling the challenges that moving to a new assessment system can involve. Since 2018, Emma has led the Business Development team at BTL’s UK head office, where she works to guide awarding organisations and assessment providers around the world through the process of selecting and implementing new assessment solutions.

Emma’s work with new e-assessment adopters has given her a keen interest in how we can better support people facing this change, to ensure the least stressful experience for every e-assessment user and candidate. In her role at BTL, Emma also helps drive strategic growth by understanding the needs of awarding organisations and designing services to meet those needs. Emma was first elected to the board of the e-Assessment Association in 2018, and in the last year has taken on a new role co-ordinating activity amongst eAA board member volunteers, helping to organise projects and activity across the association.

Profile

Richard Little

RM

Richard Little. RM

With over 20 years’ experience in delivering large scale hardware and software programmes, Richard started his career as a software developer, and then built on this technical background in a range of management roles spanning telecoms, business systems software development and information security. For the past 7 years, Richard has led the e-assessment proposition strategy for RM.

Richard is responsible for managing RM’s existing customer propositions and developing new ones in the fields of e-assessment, school MIS, safeguarding and managed IT services.  Working closely with schools, government ministries, examination boards and professional awarding bodies, Richard is seeking to stay one step ahead of what they may need.

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Rajeev Menon

Talview

Rajeev Menon. Talview

An accomplished sales and product innovation specialist in the assessments space, Rajeev has over 16 years of experience with multiple global assessment providers. He has played important roles in the development of the assessments space in India as part of the leadership team at MeritTrac, one of India’s foremost assessment services company with a global footprint now. He was involved in creating and introducing some pathbreaking assessment and delivery products including automated spoken English assessments, candidate authentication service for high stake exams, digital marking in India and behavioral assessments for front line sales and leadership positions. He was responsible for establishing an offshore marking practice in India for exams in Europe. He has also worked extensively with experts in the field of IRT as well as item analysis and equating of large volume data in high stakes exams. At Talview, he has been instrumental in some of the key assessment product and services such as Talview Behavioral Insights and Proview – Talview’s remote proctoring solution.

He also currently provides strategic advice to Recruitment Tech and Ed Tech companies on assessment products.

Profile

Paul Muir

British Council

Paul Muir. British Council

Paul Muir is Head of Technology Enabled Assessment at the British Council and responsible for the British Council’s technology enabled assessment strategy and delivery of technology led assessment solutions in over 140 countries around the world and to over 4.5 million students a year. Joining the British Council in 2015, Paul has worked in the assessment industry for over 20 years, in roles delivering education and curriculum reform projects across the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, to transformational roles at Awarding Bodies and Regulators in the UK.

Currently serving as the Chair of E-ATP (Association of Test Publishers - Europe), Paul has a passion for enhancing access to education globally using technology, especially in parts of the world where this is not always the ‘easy’ path and where innovative and more unique ways of working can be rewarded.

Delivering equity in an unequal world of assessment, a gap that has been further widened by the Covid pandemic, is where Paul strives to make a significant difference in the coming years. The opportunity to become a Board member of the e-Assessment Association and work alongside peers from across the e-assessment community is one I know Paul would embrace and thrive upon.

Nominated by Eunice McAllister – Head of Business Development, British Council

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Mel Nethercott

PSI Services

Mel Nethercott. PSI Sevices

Mel Nethercott is currently Vice President of International Business Development for PSI Services’ Credentialing business.  His role relies on his ability to understand the challenges that the market faces, particularly in the aftermath of the pandemic and the seismic changes this brought to the sector.  By clear and careful assessment of the client’s needs, he ensures that the delivery of services is consistent with the scope of the requirements, the regulatory environment and PSI’s visions, values and service culture.

Mel has extensive experience within diverse organisations across the global Computer Based Testing services space, managing complex, consultative business development programmes to achieve strategic objectives from inception to completion.  He has achieved this through building effective working relationships across all aspects of business including clients, internal team members, service provider partners and channel agents.  Previous positions held by Mel included MD of Certify Assessment/ITTS, Founder and Sales Director of KITE/TEAM, and Sales Director at Executrain.

Mel is a lifelong member of the Learning & Performance Institute, and has always actively engaged with the broader credentialing sector including his involvement with membership organisations such as the eAssessment Association and ATP, as well as regular posting of blogs and thought leadership pieces.

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Theodora Ntoka

ACER UK

Theodora Ntoka. ACER UK

Theodora is passionate about universal design in education and in e-assessments specifically, and believes in promoting inclusivity and accessibility in an attempt to remove many of the barriers faced by learners. She has held teaching and teacher coordination roles, involving the design and development of assessments for over ten years. She introduced online formative and diagnostic assessments in a college setting for international students, and held a lead role in the digitisation of all assessment content for that college.

Theodora currently works in the UK office of the Australian Council for Educational Research, which she joined in 2019. Her role primarily focuses on e-assessment development, including item writing and reviewing, trialling, test construction and quality assurance. She is also working in a number of projects where her focus is on accessible and inclusive design.

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The nominees for the four Ordinary Board Positions

Tim Burnett

Current Chair of the e-Assessment Association and Independent Assessment Marketing Consultant.

Tim is a highly experienced and active member of the global educational technology community. Over the last 15 years, Tim has demonstrated his keen desire to advance the use of technology in assessment, ensuring testing is fair, and improving the value of testing.

Tim’s mission is to build thriving communities within the educational technology sector. Tim has been a leader in award-winning work which has brought together diverse global communities during challenging times. As an independent member of the community, Tim is keen to continue as an active member of the assessment thought leadership community and lead the e-Assessment Association through one of the most pivotal periods in its history.

Since becoming Chair to the eAA Board in 2021, Tim has kick-started several initiatives that will support the community and raise awareness of the associations work and goals. These include introducing an enhanced calendar of activities, introducing innovative learning tools for members, supporting the delivery of the associations highly successful virtual conference and awards, and reaching out to members of the community to understand the challenges they face to inform the association's priorities going forward.

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tburnett

Profile

Emma Dawkins

I have worked in the education sector for 28 years as a teacher, examiner and awarding organisation senior manager the last 8 years of which have been in executive level academic management positions.

I am Academic Director with NCUK, a global awarding organisation of foundation and higher-level Business, Computing and English qualifications. Owned by the Northern Consortium of UK Universities, NCUK places international students in leading Universities in UK. Australia and USA. I lead the design, delivery, assessment, support and awarding of pathway qualifications for learners in 20+ countries on 5 continents through a network of accredited delivery partners.

I have implemented edutech solutions dating back to 2003 and QCA pilots of on screen testing in Basic and Key skills, informing and building government and regulatory confidence in comparability of e-assessment for public exams. I am NCUK Executive sponsor for a business wide digital transformation change programme delivering digital capability in teaching, learning, assessment, student management, QA, Uni admissions and customer relationship management all in an international context. Recognition for our achievements to date came with the PIE 2021 Award for Digital Innovation – Assessment and Credentials.

Profile

Tim Downie

I am the founder of Adactia Consulting Ltd. which provides business and market strategy advice to Assessment and Ed-Tech organisations around the world.

As a previous board member of the E-AA, I focused especially upon the business plan and strategy for the association. This included the creation and ongoing development of the business plan that supported the launch of the E-AA awards, the adoption of the E-Assessment conference and the re-structuring of the E-AA to create more opportunities for sustainable growth in both revenue and influence.

I have worked in the Assessment and Ed-Tech industries for 30 years. This includes 10 years as Sales & Marketing Director for RM Results developing the UK and international e-marking and e-assessment business and senior roles with technology providers to Education and the Public Sector. More recently I worked with organisations, including some E-AA sponsors, from the USA, India, Australia and the UK to help with strategy development and execution.

If elected, I will work with Matt and the team to continue strengthening the foundations of the E-AA so that we have the influence and revenues we need to serve our members and to promote best practice and innovation across the global assessment community.

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Martha Gibson

Enhancements Programme Manager, Heriot-Watt University, UK & eAA Board member & Sponsorship Secretary

I’ve been honoured to serve on the eAA Board for 3 years and I’d like to stand again for a further term. In my time as a Board member, I’ve also been the Sponsorship Secretary, managing the relationship between the eAA and our valued sponsors. I’d like to remain in that role so that I can continue managing and building on those relationships and together, make the eAA the global meeting place for our industry. I’ve also been proactive in all Board activity – I’ve been a judge 3 times for the eAA Awards, been a Chair at the annual conference, edited the quarterly newsletters and have been involved in the conference and awards committee. I’m also an eAA Awards winner in the Export category in 2017.

I have many years of experience in e-assessment in the UK and around the world and in education more generally and I now work at Heriot-Watt University in the UK. Covid-19 has created many opportunities to take e-assessment into a new phase and my work in HE and with the eAA community is at the centre of this – learning from what has gone before and working within the industry to create and innovate in e-assessment.

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Romana Moss

My name is Romana. I have worked in education for over 20 years. I have worked in Universities, a Royal Medical College, a Membership Body, a Conservative and now I work in an Award Organisation. I have vast experience of working in CBT, process enhancement, LMS systems, implementing RI and core system digital transformation. I specialise in innovating education with technology whilst enhancing the value of technology in the workplace across operations.

I would love the opportunity to be a member of the eAssessment Board and support all the wonderful work and innovation in the industry.

Profile

James Stockdale

Having spent over 25 years in the awarding sector, and having seen technological change and development that enhances and improves the assessment offer, I’m extremely passionate about championing what technology can do to assist in the mechanics and science of assessment.

All of us in the awarding sector have had to move extremely swiftly in the times of the pandemic and do things that we might think were not possible. Where we might be nervous about rolling out solutions as swiftly as we have, they have worked and we continue to appreciate what e-assessment solutions can offer us. We are now in a place where technology is at the forefront of everything we do in the sector. This is what I am passionate about, and can talk and discuss authoritatively about from the perspective of an awarding body.

I started my career working for RSA/OCR examinations working in and around the CLAIT examinations, including the move to offer these via an e-assessment route. From that point, as I found myself in director-level, and responsible officer positions, as well as executive board positions embracing the change opportunities I found in various organisations including the CISI, the IMI and the RAD.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-stockdale/

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eAA Sponsors