The New Zealand Qualifications Authority has stopped enrolments in a Manukau Institute of Technology course after discovering students were being marked too leniently.
The MIT course had about 150-200 students last year and fewer than 60 were being re-assessed due to marking issues. Photo: 123RF
The institute is re-assessing fewer than 60 students in the Level 5 business diploma.
The general manager of the institute's Manukau campus, Luka Crosbie, said an NZQA report delivered in November said there were problems with the assessment tasks its tutors were setting and with their marking of those tasks.
"The issues were mainly around the assessment tasks. There were some slight differences between the assessment tasks and the learning outcomes and also we needed to have a closer look and make sure that our marking was tighter," he said.
Crosbie said the authority recently required the institute to stop taking new enrolments until the problems were addressed.
"They did say that some of our marking was overgenerous. So therefore we're going through every assessment and we're getting it re-marked and we're going to get it externally moderated as well to ensure our re-marking is up to scratch."
"There are some students that will require some reassessment. That may take the form of re-marking or a challenge test or some sort of professional discussion," he said.
"We're working through that on a case-by-case basis with a view to validating their assessment."
Crosbie said the course had about 150-200 students last year, most of them domestic students, and fewer than 60 were being re-assessed.
He acknowledged that the authority's statutory action could harm the institute's standing.
"I think anybody would have concern for their reputation," he said.
Crosbie said the problems with assessment were not restricted to one tutor.
He said MIT was not alone in having problems with the diploma and NZQA had reviewed the diploma nationally in 2018.