University of Applied Sciences

Transforming Education with Holistic Assessment

Fontys University of Applied Sciences wants to train adaptive professionals that will be prepared for an unpredictable future, as stated in their strategic plan towards talent-oriented education. Find out how Portflow has helped Fontys to make the learning journey of their students very visible and trackable, and has also improved the growth and self-directedness of their students.

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The institution

Get to know Fontys

Fontys University of Applied Sciences is an innovative higher education provider, with several institutes and campuses spread over the southern part of The Netherlands. Fontys provides education to over 44,000 students and offers a great variety of programmes at both the undergraduate and postgraduate level.

Students have to work on ‘wicked problems’, which are authentic problems from real clients that students bring in themselves and which do not necessarily have a pre-made solution. Students can solve these with research and concept creation, for which it’s important that their actions are context rich and reflect an environmental awareness.

Founded in: 1996
# of students: 44.000+
Location: Various locations throughout the Netherlands

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“Student ownership has become visible very quickly because of Portflow. It all becomes much more trackable what a student is doing and what that learning journey looks like. That visibility is effortlessly seen in the growth and self-sufficiency of students.”

Brigit Kolen – Educational Innovator, Expert in Programmatic Assessment and Challenge-based Learning at Fontys

challenge

Preparing Students for an Unpredictable Future

Fontys wants to train adaptive professionals that will be prepared for an unpredictable future, as stated in their strategic plan towards talent-oriented education. In their 5 principles of learning, Fontys has already positioned their students as the primary owner of their own learning, based on the selfdetermination theory. They envision a digital learning environment where students can control what, how and when they learn – a place where their students can not only manifest their autonomy, but also build on their sense of responsibility.

Therefore, their education had to be designed accordingly. In line with this vision, Fontys was looking for a learning platform that would meet the following 3 requirements:

Ownership

The platform must allow students to take ownership of their learning, and therefore the student must be enabled to take the lead.

Snapshots

It must be possible to make snapshots of portfolios, that can be submitted for summative assessments.

Integrate

The platform must integrate deeply with Fontys’ VLE, Canvas, and should not be yet another standalone tool.

The solution

Deploying Portflow for Holistic Assessment and Learner Agency

Fontys’ search has led them to Portflow, the learning experience portfolio for holistic assessment and learner agency, to build the skill-set for career-ready professionals. Portflow prepares students for lifelong learning by appealing more to their intrinsic learning motivation and by centralising the development of programme-level outcomes and competencies.

Other crucial factors in their decision were Portflow’s ability to provide insight into learning that occurs non-linear, the stress for students and assessment peak for teachers that Portflow takes away towards the end of the semester, and most importantly that it fitted into their pedagogical vision.

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The Results

Key Benefits Delivered by Portflow

THE ABILITY TO TRACK A STUDENT’S LEARNING JOURNEY AND PERSONAL GROWTH

Portflow has provided Fontys with an ePortfolio solution to implement programmatic assessment at their institute. Along their personal learning journey, students take ownership of their work by collecting evidence from their experiences and linking them to the outcomes and skills required for becoming adaptive professionals.

BETTER STREAMLINED FEEDBACK

In Portflow, there is a feedback request feature that allows students to take ownership of their work by asking for feedback from peers, coaches, and also external reviewers and involved parties. The feedback provided on a student’s work remains visible in Portflow, no matter where a student places their work in their portfolio. This has made it much easier for the teachers and coaches to see whether a student’s work has received feedback and whether the feedback loop is closed or not.

STUDENTS ARE EMPOWERED TO LEARN IN A WAY THAT SUITS THEM

Because Portflow is a non-linear learning platform, it allows students to work in a way that matches their learning preference the best. With Portflow, students at Fontys are empowered to decide for themselves what evidence they create, how they structure their portfolios, when and whom to request feedback from, and what they eventually submit within the VLE that proves their achievements. This results in an inclusive learning experience for students.

EMBRACING UNPREDICTABILITY WITH FLEXIBILITY

By giving their students (scaffolded) control over their own learning activities and processes, Fontys recognised that this would yield a certain amount of unpredictability in the resulting learning processes and activities. Portflow enabled Fontys to fully embrace this unpredictability with flexibility in a platform that allows users to share, document and interact on developmental progress with any given learning flow.

LOWER STRESS TOWARDS THE END OF THE SEMESTER FOR BOTH STUDENTS AND TEACHERS

Prior to discovering Portflow, students at Fontys used to make their portfolios in Microsoft Teams, as a PDF-document. This not only resulted in extremely large PDF documents, but also an increased workload for students, as well as an assessment peak for teachers towards the end of the semester. With Portflow, students can create their portfolio’s on the fly throughout the course and teachers can provide feedback at their own pace mid-semester.

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