Examinations have been an instrument of evaluation for centuries now. Yet, few things have changed in the concept of examination. That disturbs me as we move into the digital age. I fear this stagnancy will result in inefficient, even stupid, ways of examining a candidate.
An examination, in most cases, ends up abusing the scale of time. Learning that happens over a period of months or even years is difficult to reproduce in a span of hours, irrespective of one’s actual skill level. However, it does take a great deal away from the examination. Laboratory examinations become difficult to normalize for every student, paper examinations bring logistic delays and corruption and cheating become factors to be circumvented.
Mind you: My argument is not against the contents of an examination or the skills it attempts to evaluate. Each subject shall have its caveats and limitations. That is a much more complicated debate. I merely remark on the transition of evaluation methodology as we move into the digital age, the changes remote examinations have ushered in, and its socioeconomic effects.
Widespread acceptance of distance-education classes begets the era of remote proctoring. At N.C. State, Delta assists a lot of departments in setting up distance-education courses. Delta also has two offices where it conducts exams for distance-education students who cannot make it on the normal exam schedule.
For remote students, Delta has a list of proctoring centers spread across the nation, with higher density on the East Coast. These consist of public universities and libraries, mostly. A remote student is asked to choose his or her proctor. A couple of forms later, on a predetermined date and time, the student takes the examination in the proctor’s presence. Seems like a smooth system, except a lot of loopholes remain unplugged.
Having a student choose his or her own proctor leaves doors open for corruption. A widespread network of proctors is far from reality. The cost of proctoring is to be undertaken by students, which leads to students choosing cheap proctors who might not uphold the policies of an examination. Ideally, the cost of evaluation should be included in planning a course.
Khan Academy and Coursera are web portals that offer similar courses and successful evaluations. There are a limited number of resources due to the shortage of technology and surrounding subjects. Oral examinations, such as dissertation defenses, are also operated via Skype in a lot of universities, including N.C. State.
The Graduate Records Examination and Scholastic Assessment Tests, otherwise known as the GRE and the SAT, are two very successful examinations carried out by private entities. Perhaps there is space for more of such private entities that can conduct regular examinations for university classes. Customized examination policies can be worked out with universities. Minimizing exam centers owned by these companies will keep costs low and accommodate more students.
Distance education allows universities to reach a larger audience using the same amount of teaching resources. This leads to extra profit that can be channeled into paying for privatized institutions that help with quality examinations.
Online technologies such as Skype allow for robust, live video feeds. Using Skype on a wider basis to proctor a vast number of remote students poses interesting technological challenges, but these are the challenges that will allow for fair remote examinations.
Examinations in rural areas pose a completely different challenge that technology will find difficult to penetrate. Lack of infrastructure, psychological blocks and so on, are only a few of the obstacles. Like all fragile ideas, remote examinations will require manual catalysts in these places. These solutions require an assortment of infrastructure and manual efforts. Privatizing this exercise may be a solution that needs to be looked into now.