Talking about integrity
I believe it is important to come up with a way to do online exams and protect the integrity of those exams without having to set up additional time and space for a proctor. Employers are starting to see more fraudulant degrees. When teaching online courses acrossed the nation this would be quite difficult as well as costly. Any ideas?
Debra:
Protecting the integrity of exams in an online environment is a real challenge. We can take several measures. One would be to change the questions on the exam for each offering of the course. Another would be to administer parallel versions of the same exam to the same group of students. If we were to apply any of these two measures, we have to keep in mind that students would still have access to their textbook and supplementary reading materials, and even th ecourse materials unless they are locked out of the course during the exam period.
Another possible solution is to release the exam ofr a specified amount of time. The exam would be a timed exam, released once only for the specified period. And we would definitely have to change the questions for the next offering of the course. When the exam is times in this manner, students would not have the opportunity to share questions with each other; neither would they have time to look up answers in text books and other learning materials. This strategy, however, lends itself to criticism as it contradicts one of the arguments for the benefits of online learning-----flexibility.
Many Instructors with whom I have worked recognize the problems with online exams and therefore have reverted to testing theory based knowledge using parallel versions of tests using a random test item generator. These theory based exams do not carry a high percentage of the final grade. The high percentage of the final grade is based on Assignments and major projects.
Satrohan
As the college where I work at struggles with the question of exam integrity, I am encouraged by the suggestion that the exam's value, as it relates to the percentage of the final grade, be lowered. My personal experience has been that my involvement in projects and assignments fosters "true learning" of the content versus "cramming" for exams.
I think about this a lot and don't have any solution to the problem yet.
Thank you for sharing your personal experience with us, Larry. The majority of higher institutions of learning for which I provide support place th highest emphasis on projects and assignments when they award grades.
Satrohan
Gloria:
we look forward to your thoughts on this issue which can have a significant impact on the future of online learning if fraudalent activities continue to escalate.
Satrohan
We seem to share the same thoughts on this topic. I believe one of the easier ways to protect exam integrity is to offer timed exams. Allowing extended periods of time for exams promotes laziness and encourages the unauthorized use of course materials! If students are sufficiently prepared, there should be no problem. However, it is crucial that the Instructor create the exam with the time limit in mind and plan accordingly.
Belinda:
The question behind the minds of most institutions is how do they know that the person who registered for the online course is the person taking the exam. Timed exams that cannot be printed can minimize cheating. Timed exams do no resolve the problem of verifying that the right person is taking the exam from a distance.
Satrohan
Another way to keep the integrity of the quizzes is by having a quiz pool. Here students will have a difficult time cheating because each student taking the quiz will have different questions and if student know about the quiz pool, it may discourage them from cheating.
Kevin:
Using random test item selection to create parallel versions of the Quizzes would definitley minimize the chances of students excahnging answers. Timing the Quiz may also help. The key fo success here is to have a large enough item pool.
Satrohan
I agree with the timing on quizzes. The tests I use have a time limit of 1 hour for 10 to 15 questions. For the quiz pool, there are 60 to 65 questions that are available for the quizzes, preventing chances of cheating
Kevin:
The number of questions seems high enough. If the Course Delivery Platform you are suing allows for randomization of item selection as well as randomization of options in a multiple choice question, you can use both and that can increase the variety.
Satrohan
Exam intregity is important, however exams may not be the only method to assess if a student learned. As educators we need to seek alternative evaluative methods that can assess learning has occured for all types of learners.
Kathleen:
Some institutions administer proctored exams to maintain exam integrity; however, your suggestion to use alternative measures is well taken.
Satrohan
It may depend in part on the class size. For a small class it could almost be run like a seminar with each student getting a different set of open-ended short essay questions.
For a larger class one possibility is, as suggested, a pool of multiple choice questions with different ones assigned to different students. Perhaps these could also be somewhat open in the sense that they will require research (or at least a good knowledge of the subject)to find the correct answers.
Neither strategy is perfect, and both are a lot more labor-intensive but they put the burden more on the students to learn.
Richard:
Finding a perfect solution is always more difficult than striving for what is practically achievable. Different types of test items are better suited for assessing different types of outcomes. Multiple Choice have serve their own purpose; so do short answers. I respect your suggestion to use assessment measures that are more labor-intensive as these will require th students to exert more mental effort---even if they were open-book exams with more than ample time to complete.
Satrohan
This is a great solution to this problem. Are all course delivery platforms created FAIRLY equal? If not, is the ability to produce parallel exams typically exclusive to out of the box software? Also, is the ability to deliver an exam to a remote student at a set-time a common feature of most course delivery platforms? Could the tests be available to a student over a period of time (example: within a 1 hour window)? How do you handle the time zone issue for exam delivery?
Sorry for the overflow of questions by the way.
Gregory:
All intelligent questions. The majority of Course Delivery Platforms with which I am familiar possess the core set of deliver features as well as performance tracking. The answer is yes to all of your questions. In terms of releasing the exam at a certain date, for a certain time, for students in a diffeent time-zone, what we will have to do is release the exam for a long enough period to accommodate the time difference as the controlling factor in this situation is time to complete the exam. The other alternative is to group students by time-zone, and adminsiter the exam using the same parameters.
Satrohan
A couple of ways have been suggested in protecting the integrity of exams. Short answer and in a limited time frame seems to be the best solution. For one of my online courses, the exam was available for a limited number of days and we had two hours to complete it. The only way two individual could work on it at the same time is if they were in the same room and/or logged in and were able to send messages to each other.
Addititionally, one exam could be posted on one day and then the next day another one could be posted. Allowing only access to the quiz during this time would eliminate communication with other students. However, all of this would take some computer programming.
Charlotte:
The more we consider alternatives for onsite exams and proctored exams, the more wrok will be involved. For example, multiple equivalent versions of exams will have to be created. Even for short answer and essay type exams, i would rcommend that th questions be changed every offering. You mighthave heard of the kinds of student networks that can be established without an institution knowing and even be able to trace.
Satrohan
