With more than 30 years of experience in education and assessment, Pascal Couture is currently the Director of Digital Assessment Provincial Coordination within the Ministry of Education for the Government of Alberta. He holds a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in Public Relations from Laval University and a Bachelor of Education (B.Ed.) from the University of Alberta. He began his career as a high school science teacher at the Conseil Scolaire Centre-Nord, a Francophone school board in Edmonton, Alberta, where he taught for 15 years and served as Project Lead for the Fédération des conseils scolaires francophones de l’Alberta for nearly four years.

In 2013, a former colleague alerted Pascal to a career opportunity at the Ministry of Education in the area of digital systems and services. He made the transition from teaching to the Ministry, and for 10 years, he worked on laying the groundwork that would make the transition from paper-based to digital assessments possible. Following a competitive procurement process, Alberta began implementing digital assessments in partnership with Vretta in 2023. By September 2026, the transition of all provincial achievement tests and diploma exams to digital format will be complete across the province.

In his own words, Pascal states that early in his teaching career, in the mid-1990s, he was motivated to build his assessment capacity so that he could assess his high school science students fairly and authentically. He stumbled upon software (LXR Test) that he began using to manage his item bank more efficiently and generate multiple forms, rather than using a word processor. LXR created a computer testing add-on that enabled the administration of computer-based tests to students, complete with automated scoring. He administered his first digital exam to a group of Biology 20 (a high school science course that prepares students for university entrance) students in a computer lab during the 1997-98 school year. The exam included approximately five or six item types, including some questions with embedded video. The students were excited to take their tests on a computer, and they were especially impressed to get their results instantly. Pascal considered the vast potential of using technology to evaluate students. Over time, he began incorporating certain websites (e.g., ChemCollective) into his day-to-day instruction. The idea of integrating a virtual lab into a chemistry assessment to evaluate skills and knowledge that could not be assessed on a paper-and-pencil test became a goal. Many years before joining Alberta Education, he had been thinking about the day when provincial examinations could be administered digitally.

Pascal states that he has learned a great deal, navigating everything from change management to government procurement. He has worked with wonderful people at the Ministry and built relationships with many education leaders in the field. He feels fortunate to have been able to work on something he has been passionate about for more than three decades, and to have had the opportunity to turn it into something tangible that will modernize and improve the way students are assessed for years to come. Thirty-two years into his career as an educator and civil servant, he states that this provincial, large-scale digital assessment modernization initiative is his legacy project – a project he reflects on with satisfaction and pride.