The University of South Australia (UniSA) has found a promising solution to the pressure placed on academic integrity caused by AI tools such as ChatGPT: Interactive Oral Assessments (IOAs). These live assessments are replacing traditional written exams in some programs, offering students a more personalised way to show what they’ve learnt, while tackling the challenges AI poses to fair evaluation.
Why the Switch?
Written or online exams are becoming less effective at truly measuring a student’s understanding. With the rise of AI, students can quickly generate responses that don’t reflect their own work, generating answers via AI tools and simply copy-pasting them into answer boxes. That’s where IOAs come in. Instead of sitting for a written exam, students engage in a one-on-one conversation with a marker or unit coordinator, showcasing their knowledge in a more authentic, interactive way. It’s a format that makes it nearly impossible for students to rely on AI during the assessment.
Student Benefits
Dr. Sarah Davey, a biosciences lecturer at UniSA, explains that the conversational setting helps students perform better because it feels less intimidating. This new format has led to a 15% improvement in final exam scores, a 20% boost in overall course performance, and a 40% increase in student satisfaction at UniSA. “Interactive Oral Assessments are proving a fantastic way for students to showcase their understandings without the stress of a traditional exam environment,” Dr Davey says.
“Not only do [oral assessments] facilitate student-tailored assessments, but they do so without adjusting the assessment rubric or the achievement milestones, so they’re highly effective and efficient.”
The ability to ask follow-up questions allows assessors to gauge a student’s deeper understanding. This is especially helpful for students who struggle with written exams, whether due to language barriers, neurodiversity, or test anxiety.
- Alleviates stress felt during traditional exam settings
- Opportunity to gauge student understanding
- Easy to conduct and easy to mark
- Helpful for a diverse range of people such as neurodiverse or international students
- Fluid and personalised
Protecting Academic Integrity
With AI becoming more advanced, cheating is a growing concern. Dr. Chris Della Vedova, a senior lecturer at UniSA, notes that while AI can be used to prepare for exams, it’s nearly impossible to use it during an IOA. Since the assessments are live and interactive, there’s no chance for students to rely on pre-written or AI-generated responses. Since UniSA introduced IOAs in 2022, there’s been no academic integrity breaches in the courses that use IOAs, proving the format’s effectiveness.
Disadvantages of IOAs
However, IOAs do come with some potential challenge. For large cohorts, managing one-on-one sessions can be time-consuming and logistically difficult. Scheduling these individualised assessments takes much more coordination than a typical written exam. The need for scheduling one-on-one sessions with assessors, often over multiple days or weeks, can place a significant strain on both school and administrative staff. Additionally, conducting IOAs online can be tricky, with potential technical issues like poor internet connections disrupting the flow of the assessment.
- Difficult to organise with large cohorts
- Students may feel they don’t have enough opportunity to prepare
- May be distractions or cheating if conducted online
- Logistical nightmare to organise one-on-one meetings
- Difficult to compare student understanding
While IOAs aren’t without their challenges, they represent a promising way to ensure academic integrity while offering a more personalised, less stressful assessment experience, and the future of assessment design in an age of AI.
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Out with exams, in with verbal assessments – News and events – University of South Australia