Digital eksamen / Digital exam

Digital eksamen er en an hovedsatsingene i «Det digitale universitet».

Prosjektleder Nora Clarke gir her en presentasjon av status for prosjektet.

I am soon on my way to Ireland to talk about UiA and Norway`s approach to digital exams, my homeland is wonderful but they have only just started to think of digital exams as a possibility..

So what is happening at UiA these days?

7,500 candidates or almost 4,000 unique students in 135 subjects across all the faculties will take their closed book exam digitally this Autumn.  During the most recent exams period,  on one particular day, 447 engineering students turned up to take their 2 hour exam in 23 locations, at the same time, in Grimstad. 96% delivered their exam digitally, the first student under 10 minutes, 4% had to start on pen and paper, they had not done the necessary preparations in advance of the exam. The students had the possibility to get their results immediately.  The censor had minimum work to do after the exam. The remaining digital exams were traditional written exams where the students used their own laptops instead of pen and paper to take their up to 6 hour examinations. Censors have access to these papers the day after the examination and now can with ease correct legible answers from their students now. Some censors are delighted to do this correcting online, some still prefer to print out their papers and correct in the traditional way.

We have come a long way since we started this work three years ago at UiA. Students don`t have to print out their home exams/assignment’s anymore and take the trip into UiA but can hand in these from anywhere. They even get a confirmation now when this deliver this!

UiA has also made a significant contribution to the national work being done by Norgesuniversitet, UHR and UNINETT and has been a “consultant” for many other higher education institutions who  look to us for advice on how to approach the many challenges we have had along the way.

We still have a way to go.

–         Large parts of the examination work flow are now digitalized, more subprocesses have to be digitalized and more has to be automated.

–         Students have to get used to doing  some preparations in advance of their exam, at least for their first digital exam, it is not enough anymore to turn up and hope for the best with a pen in your hand!

–         Some teachers need time to get accustomed to a new way of preparing and correcting their exams.

–         “Only” 35% of traditional school exams are now digitalized, we need to increase those numbers from the Spring.

–         We should be-able to demand that the student has a PC or a MAC, just like other learning material, most of them do already. A case will be put forward to “Kunnskapsdepartmentet” soon.

–         Teachers need to continue to rethink the way they examine their students, a traditional school exam should not be automatically the first choice.

–         The administrative organization of digital exams is huge and needs to settle, we are not yet there but we are well on our way.

Are you a student or a teacher and have a digital exam this Autumn?

Sign up for a workshop on kompetanse.uia.no.

For more information:

Student: www.uia.no/eksamen

Teacher: http://www.uia.no/student/eksamen/faglaerer-sensor