I am suggesting an investigation/pilot and potential dissemination of a model which would allow Blackboard Learn, Turnitin and the PebblePad eportfolio system to be used to gather and analyse students' "feedback on feedback". This bid does not aim at developing a new tool. It is about finding a smart way of utilising the current arsenal of IS tools to extract this useful data – and disseminating it further.

All Schools are maximising their efforts to increase the quality and timeliness of the feedback which is released to students. By currently taking part in the 'Needs assessment of Assessment & Feedback turnaround time' exercise (to be reported to the L&T Committee later this year) I have had a chance to speak to nine admin teams from different Schools about their assessment workflows.

As a result of that it has been highlighted that the Schools are not able to determine their students' satisfaction with their assignments' feedback. The usefulness of feedback to students remains an even more burning unknown given the University's NSS results.

However, it is believed that some students would happily communicate to their School about their perceived usefulness of the feedback, provided the mechanism for such communication is very straightforward and not time-consuming. It is also suggested that the timing of this communication is crucial. For example, it might take place immediately after accessing the written feedback but before seeing the actual grade.

Ideally, I would like to be able to develop a mechanism which relies on two very simple questions which would be directed at students as part of the assignment feedback release process: 'Does the feedback seem helpful at all?' and 'Are you happy with your performance?'. Amongst the answer options the student would find:

• Helpful - Unhelpful
• Happy - Not happy

I realise that the proposed question prototypes do not cover all the issues around the quality of feedback and its student perception. However, it would make a very good starting point for Schools to start gauging how students perceive feedback. If they are able to produce reports based on responses to these two questions (whilst identifying courses/programmes of their origin), it would move them closer to identifying areas where feedback quality should be reviewed.