I got my assessment results and feedback for both Body of Work and Contextual Studies today. I was extremely surprised (pleasantly).
I was awarded:
- 80% for Body of Work
- 73% for Contextual Studies
I’m amazed that I got such a high mark for Body of Work as I found it quite a thorny and frustrating journey. And I’m doubly surprised that the BoW result is higher than the CS one, as I generally felt that my written work for Level 3 was more robust than my creative work. I am of course delighted with both marks.
The feedback for both, but especially BoW, are giving me reassurance about my embryonic SYP journey.
Breakdown against assessment criteria
- Demonstration of Technical & Visual Skills:
- 16/20
- “Complete fluency of technical and visual skills.”
- Quality of Outcome:
- 31/40
- “Highly effective work presented in a professional way, showing strong judgement. Highly effective grasp of ideas and communication of visual ideas.”
- Demonstration of Creativity:
- 16/20
- “Strongly creative, takes risks with many imaginative and successful outcomes. Excellent synthesis of analytical and creative thinking, integrating significant independent judgements and clearly articulating a defined personal voice.”
- Context:
- 17/20
- “Critical awareness of an exceptional breadth of contexts and debates extending your personal and/or professional knowledge and understanding.”
Selected comments
I won’t paste in the entire feedback (or feed-forward in OCA parlance) but I found a few extracts to be particularly encouraging, especially as I had been so full of self-doubt for much of the course:
- “This was a very strong, carefully considered submission which demonstrated a clear development and progression…”
- Very pleased to see this comment – I was hoping that what I lacked in consistency, I made up for in ‘development and progression’! My BoW experience was very much about ‘the journey’
- “… in terms of both the practical creative output and subsequent underpinning context, through rigorous testing and critical reflection”
- I appreciate the ‘both’ bit – I was OK with critical reflection part but by the end had kind of lost sight of whether the creative output was up to a good standard
- “There was a very clear understanding of the relationship between memory and the photograph (as a trigger), with incisive statements such as ‘encourage reflection on how a visual image or a scene can trigger an unrelated memory’ in the present.”
- I now realise the extent to which my BoW was informed by my CS research; I wasn’t always certain how they interacted
- “The final physical submission was visually strong and sensitively executed, having been comprehensively critically reflected upon throughout”
- Good – I put a lot of thought into how to present the overall set of assignments for the physical presentation, as there was so much variation in content (due to changing ideas a few times) that I felt the way to get to all to hang together was to present it as a learning journey!
- “[…] the difficult objective in terms of trying to photograph a memory, for which the idea to re-photograph the projections, in an attempt to add a layer of abstraction, was both confident and ambitious.”
- I was pleased to see this comment – the only mention of a specific assignment – as that particular execution remains my personal favourite. Although I do concede that the artistic strategy of the final assignment perhaps expresses my intended ideas more successfully, I got personal satisfaction from arriving at that particular solution to my artistic problem
- “Excellent work!”
- I liked the final comment, especially the enthusiasm I inferred from the exclamation mark!
Contextual Studies
Just a few words on CS, not generally covered by this learning log but I’ll make an exception.
The 73% breaks down as:
- Demonstration of Subject Based Knowledge and Understanding: 11/15
- Demonstration of Research Skills: 18/25
- Demonstration of Critical & Evaluation Skills: 26/35
- Communication: 18/25
Main comments:
- “A strong piece of work with plenty of good insights, weaving practice and theory together to good effect. Well done.”
- Liked the weaving part – I placed a lot of emphasis on balancing practice and theory in the essay
- “Your introduction only finds clarity towards the end, however, and might have benefited from a little re-drafting in order to present more focus to your inquiry from the outset.”
- Fair comment – I did redraft it but maybe not enough times to really hone it
- “Overall, assessors felt that your subject was well-researched and your argument well-made, and it was noted that you took a range of appropriate considerations into account”
- Pleased with this comment as I did take pains to cast my research net wide enough to gather a range of inputs, whilst trying hard to keep the overall essay quite tightly focused – which I did not always find easy
Feeding into SYP
One of my excuses for lack of progress on SYP so far was not knowing how I had done at assessment for BoW. Well, now that excuse is no longer valid and more importantly, was something I needn’t have worried about in the first place.
I am hugely encouraged by the positive feedback on my creative work, which has removed a blocker for me on showing my work to people in the industry for feedback.
Whilst I still have reservations about the overall scope and content of SYP, I can definitely say that the mark and comments have gone a long way to reassure me about the work itself, and so is the kick up the backside that I needed!
Well done Rob and well deserved – what a great way to start your SYP journey.
LikeLike
Thank you!
LikeLike
Well done, a great result.
LikeLike
Thanks :-)
LikeLike
Congratulations Rob!! It was worth all that effort and I am sure you got the great mark as a result of bravely changing course.
Keep going!
Jane
LikeLike
Ha, thanks Jane, I still think brave and foolhardy are synonyms 😜
LikeLike
Congrats again ! (No random emojis here)
LikeLike
Thanks again! You’re a great inspiration 👍
LikeLike
Congratulations Rob. Anne excellent result.
With best wishes Sarah https://sarahdandrewseyv.wordpress.com https://Instagram.com/sarahdandrews6387
Sent from my iPhone
>
LikeLike
Thank you!
LikeLike
Well done Rob!!
LikeLike
Cheers!
LikeLike
Congratulations Rob, hope you and yours are keeping well.
LikeLike
Thank you and yes, all good here so hope same with you!
LikeLike
Congratulations on the marks and comments, Rob. Well deserved, I’d say.
LikeLike
Thank you Julie!
LikeLike
You are a legend, mate – very well done x
LikeLike
Bless ya
LikeLike