The Self-Assessment as a Process for Professional Development of Educators and Innovation for the Pedagogical Culture of an Organization

Introduction: This study is part of the European project EDUEVAL, which engaged five European partners: Italy, Latvia, Spain, Poland and Greece and whose principle aim was to investigate the evaluation practices of Adult Education staff, taking into account all the cultural, political and pedagogical aspects of mentioned practices. The first year of work has been dedicated to a participatory research models and evaluation practices in different countries involved; analysis of which helped to create the Edueval evaluation model. The framework is based on a combination between external evaluation, evaluation of the context and self-assessment. This model was tested second year into the ongoing project, in a Pilot Training Course, with a blended mode; 20 hours face to face classes and 10 hours of e-learning. The course has been conducted in each country and it aimed at defining a curriculum useful to delineate the professional Profile of the Evaluator on the European level. The following contribution questions this model from the specific perspective of self-assessment, seen as the most elusive area of evaluation, as well as the most capable of engaging a professional, a group and an organization in a systematic and thoughtful work of appraisal and regulating the activities and results of the organization (ESS Quality Glossary 2010, Unit B1 "Quality; Classifications", Eurostat, 2010). Method: We will present the findings from a workshop on self-assessment that involved twenty coordinators of educational services linked to a cooperative of Milan metropolitan area (Northern Italy). Presented during the workshop was the PORTFOLIO as a self-assessment tool that provides educators with the opportunity to: • Become aware of their pedagogical model • Monitor their professional growth • Understand the dynamics of a team organization • Improve their learning strategies • Increase their self-esteem and self-efficacy The Portfolio supports the processes of reflection and investigation on the results of educational work and the pedagogical skills (Barton, Collins 1997). The theoretical assumption at the basis of this in-depth analysis of the explicit and implicit dimensions of self-assessment were revealed using the “Clinica della Formazione” approach (Massa, 1987, Riva, 2004), which is able to analyse the elements of the discourse based on a form of "suspicious interpretation" (Roulston, 2014). Each workshop has been recorded, transcribed and analysed by the national teams. Results: The course allowed us to read the data produced in the workshops and in the student satisfaction questionnaires and to say that the self-assessment expresses the size of the formative evaluation. Self-assessment is a process that allows professionals to learn from themselves and an opportunity to exit from the conformism of organizational routines: every professional thanks to the interaction between the personal and the professional lives can help to regenerate the culture of their organization. Self-assessment is a process that allows a team to enhance its internal educational culture, their knowledge, their communicative, relational and metacognitive skills to develop more effectively the pedagogical objectives of their work processes.