How to use your new ePortfolio - Top Tips

You should use the Helpdesk button to raise a ticket and include a full description of the problem, with screenshots if possible, so that the support agents can address queries more quickly.

FourteenFish aim to respond within 5 working days and a unique ticket reference number is generated. You should escalate to [email protected] if the response is inconclusive or unclear (including the reference number in your correspondence).

Click the green Portfolio button at the top of the screen to access the Portfolio Overview page, from which you can:

• find the Learning Logs to upload other evidence (audits, certificates, etc.)
• start assessment forms (Educational Assessments)
• check progress (Portfolio Summary and Training Map)
• locate/download historical data from the old system, if applicable (Educator Notes)

Your supervisors and assessors should receive emails from the system when you send them assessment forms to complete.  Please remember that:

• you must invite your ES and NCS to view your portfolio, and they have to create an account before they can access your evidence.
• GSATs and EPAs need to have items linked to them for the ES and NCS to review – you will not be able to get these assessments signed off without providing the required evidence. Any learning outcome can be tagged to any entry or assessment for the relevant level. However, no item should be linked/tagged more than three times.

The Curriculum Handbook outlines who signs which assessments:

• You should send EPAs to NCSs.  The NCS should normally only sign off an EPA in their own SIA. However, local solutions might be necessary in some specific areas.
• You should send GSATs to your ES. If the GSAT is signed by an NCS in error, you should contact the Helpdesk. It is likely that you will need to repeat the entire process with the correct supervisor.
• You have to do one GSAT, one EPA and one ESR every six months.
• The term “formative tool” used in the EPA is used for occasions when you might wish to demonstrate progress but are not yet ready to have that competence fully assessed. DOPS or OSATS can be used as formative rather than summative assessments. These can be tagged/linked in exactly the same way as other items.

Please use the Make a copy button to create a new version of the previous EPA or GSAT for a new Review Period.

This was a one-off exercise and only specific documents needed to be uploaded after the transfer in August 2024 (requirements were determined by the curriculum you follow).  It was not necessary to upload more evidence for competencies already signed off in the old portfolio system.

You can change the ‘tagging to’ order and switch between Level 1 & 2 and level 3 & 4 domain/ learning outcome coverage.

If you experience technical difficulties, please contact the FourteenFish Helpdesk.

Please consult the Help Centre for more details and to watch the video demonstration.

The ESR requirement has not changed and is still 2 per year, i.e. one per rotation/6 months.

For both curricula, ESRs are constructed in stages by both you and your ES, using the Prepare button in the Portfolio Summary. For the old curriculum, the Core Curriculum Progress field (Portfolio Summary) is where to record information regarding progress with General Ophthalmology and other special interest areas. This mirrors the previous system’s workflow.

You must ensure that all evidence relevant to the current Review Period has been added to the system before following the Prepare process. You should consult the Curriculum Handbook, particularly the Level Guides, and Section 7 ARCP for full details of the evidence that you need to submit. Remember that the overarching principle behind the new Programme of Assessment is that professional judgement is now based on the quality of evidence, as opposed to quantity or recommended numbers. 

Please do not attempt to complete an ESR too early as this will lock the report, and you will be asked to start a new Review Period. If your ESR form is locked before you managed to complete it, please raise a ticket with the Helpdesk.

It is recommended to use multiple windows to review information with your ES.

The process of updating Training Maps to show the next ST stage and Level is manual and will be completed by College staff as soon as possible. In the meantime, you should:

• Ensure the Review Period ending 05/08/2025 is linked to the pre-ARCP Level, if you have one in your Training Map
• Add a new Review Period (August 2025 – February 2026) and mark it as current
• Invite your new ES/NCS to gain access to your portfolio

You should be able to add new evidence and tag items to the higher Level / learning outcomes whilst waiting for your Training Map to be updated.

Your historical data – ARCPs, assessments and other documents previously stored as Additional Evidence – have been manually migrated by FourteenFish to an area called Educator Notes (bottom right-hand corner of the Portfolio interface). 

It is worth noting that historical data cannot be mapped and therefore will not automatically populate the Portfolio Summary or Training Map.

If you need to share specific items with your educational team to inform discussions, you should locate and download them from the zipped folders in the Educator Notes and then upload to your Learning Logs. No other historical item will need to be uploaded manually.

If you have correctly shared your portfolio these items will be visible by educational teams for review. Content from the old Additional Evidence tab which was too large to migrate is available on request ([email protected]).

Please contact [email protected] if your CCT date is wrong or missing.

You can upload any item to the Learning Logs. If you decide that you wish an item to be viewable by third parties, you will need to use the Request a Review button to trigger an email request to the chosen supervisor to acknowledge the item.  Items will become visible to educational teams and ARCP panels once they have been acknowledged by the chosen supervisor.

The need for a supervisor to acknowledge items is inherent to this ePortfolio and, despite multiple requests from the College, FourteenFish have advised that the process cannot be changed.

The workflow is as follows:

• Add item to Learning Logs tabs, save and tag the outcomes
• Click Request a Review to alert the supervisor
• Once acknowledged by the latter, items are visible to third parties

You must ensure that your supervisor has acknowledged your items in order that the ARCP panel can view them – if this is not the case, you should contact the TPD.

The Chair of the Curriculum Sub-Committee has developed a handy checklist for resident doctors, NCSs and ESs as to the forms that need to be completed at the end of each rotation.

The Curriculum Handbook contains full details of who completed what forms and when.

Any leave, including sick leave, that is recorded in the TOOT section will deduct from the WTE total days in training.

No examination result will show in the ePortfolio until late 2025, at the earliest, due to further technical glitches encountered by FourteenFish when transferring the data.

You should retain all correspondence from the Examinations team and, in the interim, upload result emails to the Curriculum Catch-up tab in your Learning Logs.

The ePortfolio is not replacing the existing surgical logbook. You should use the same ESR button (Output Data) to generate your PDF report and then upload it to the Logbook tab in your Learning Logs.

Please consult the Help Centre for more details.

You will find all the information you need in the Curriculum Handbook, particularly in the Level Guides and Section 7 ARCP.

You should follow this guidance for completing your MSF and also consult the Help Centre articles for more details.

• Once past the self-assessment questionnaire, please add the appropriate mix of colleagues.
• The list of assessors must be discussed and agreed with the ES prior to starting the process. Failure to do so is a probity issue.
• Only professional hospital/Trust email addresses must be used. Personal addresses are not allowed.
• The system will automatically send reminders to any non-responders 10 days after their initial invites are sent out. Should you need any further reminders sent out, please contact the Helpdesk.
• You can add assessors to the MSF at any time. Once you have received 11 responses, the option to Close Survey will become visible in the Progress box.
• The ‘Collect patient feedback’ and peer benchmarking data (percentages) should be disregarded as not applicable to Ophthalmology.
• The comparator data in the Summary Report should also be disregarded – it a feature of the system that cannot be changed.

A one-off Educator Notes entry was created by FourteenFish as a way to give access to historical data (ARCPs, assessments and other documents). This is not their main function and, in this instance, was for the purpose of migration. Please disregard any MACOSX folders.

See also ‘How to find your historical portfolio data’ further above.

Other Educator Notes may be added by your ES, TPD and Deanery administrators.

ESs and NCSs alike must be invited by you to create their own account, which will give them access to evidence you have linked to EPAs and GSATs.

Other assessors do not need an account to sign forms off. Assessment requests to complete WpBAs are sent directly by you, and emails will contain links to forms.

In some specific local circumstances, the NCS and ES can be the same person.

Please follow the link for more details about the different roles.

If you have a number of supervisors listed, this is because you have selected them yourself. You should only have an ES and NCS for each Review Period. You should try to remove the other names and raise a ticket if you need help.

Form R applies to England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The SOAR form applies to Scotland only. They are equivalent.

The Portfolio is a mechanism provided by the College for non-resident doctors and those pursuing the Portfolio Pathway to collate evidence. Instructions regarding the Review Period and ARCP do not apply.

You need an NCS to sign off EPAs. The NCS must be working as a consultant to be able to supervisor your progress. Please consult the Specialty-Specific Guidance for more details.

Please note that currently the Portfolio is unable to generate exportable PDF documents.