QAA’s April GenAI assessment discussions: student and staff input

Updated Sep 07, 2026

QAA advertised online student focus groups on GenAI and assessment for 20, 21 and 22 April 2026. Its page for the first session gives 20 April as the event date, not a publication date. The wider schedule is confirmed in QAA’s own announcement. First event page, QAA programme announcement.

What the programme establishes

QAA separately advertised quality staff roundtables for 29 April, 1 May and 5 May. It said insights would inform its quality and academic integrity work and a forthcoming policy paper. That confirms an intended use for discussion, not that particular student recommendations shaped later policy or that every advertised session took place. QAA staff-roundtable announcement.

The programme sits alongside QAA’s public GenAI resource collection. Those pages describe supporting engagement with the technology while maintaining academic standards. An event schedule is not a new regulatory requirement. QAA resources.

Make a local discussion specific

Our recommendation is to ask students about a concrete assessment context. Show the relevant permitted-use guidance and ask what remains unclear, which examples would help and whether students can explain what they are expected to disclose. Do not assume that confidence in one task transfers to another.

Include reasons for non-use as well as experiences of using tools. Give participants a way to discuss uncertainty without naming an assessed submission or another student. Explain the purpose of the discussion and how its findings will be handled.

Record who contributed, which perspectives may be missing and what the discussion can support. A focus group can reveal questions worth investigating; it cannot establish the prevalence of a view across the institution.

Give each proposed clarification an owner and a review date. Report what changed, what did not and why. Collecting views first does not itself demonstrate that those views influenced a decision.

The student comment governance checklist offers a starting point for documenting scope and interpretation.

Correction and update, 7 September 2026: corrected the event-date/publication-date confusion, retained verified advertised dates and removed unsupported claims about delivery, deliberate sequencing and policy effects.