Case Study: Oxfordshire Schools improve writing assessment and reduce teacher workload with RM Compare from RM Education

Oxfordshire schools successfully pioneer a new method of collaborative assessment and moderation

Oxfordshire Schools, led by Church Cowley St. James School in Oxford, needed a better way to assess and moderate writing across partner primary schools. Traditional marking was time-consuming, inconsistent across different writing tasks, and made collaboration difficult, so they worked with RM Education and its RM Compare digital assessment solution to find a more valid, reliable, and manageable approach.

RM Education implemented RM Compare, which uses Adaptive Comparative Judgement to let teachers compare anonymous pieces of writing side by side and build a shared professional consensus. The pilot brought together 14 schools and led to reduced marking workload, fairer and more reliable assessments, stronger CPD, and better insight into writing standards across the cohort; Church Cowley St. James then expanded the approach across Years 1–6, ten times a year, and later to five local schools for improved moderation.

Oxfordshire Schools

Steve Dew

Head teacher