The concept of identity assurance and assessment integrity is always at the forefront of our minds as a sector, and even more so of late in light of recent advances in AI tools. Assuring identity and integrity in assessment is particularly a challenge for accredited courses that must meet requirements set by accrediting bodies.
Will Billingsley, Associate Professor in Computer Science and Chair of S&T’s School Education Committee, presented at Ascilite last year on an innovative new approach to assuring identity and assessment integrity he has developed for the accreditation of Computer Science courses. His approach focuses on the overarching principle of assuring student identity as something that can be achieved through a range of different mechanisms, rather than being solely dependent on invigilation. By taking a course-level view and mapping the ways that these different methods are distributed throughout a course, a complex and robust picture emerges that is much less reliant on individual assessment tasks. The different verification methods mapped in Computer Science are:
- Proctored online exam
- TurnItIn
- Oral or live assessment
- Video submission
- Personalised assessment
- Project work
- Group work
- Data trails
Below is a matrix visualisation that shows how these methods are mapped across the Bachelor of Computer Science (Software Development & Data Science):
This ‘swiss cheese’ approach is an effective way to manage the risks of reliance on a single identity verification method, and reinforces the value of course-level assessment design. It’s also an approach that is more adaptive and resilient to disruption.
If you’d like more information on his method, you can get in touch with Will, or if you’d like advice on course-level assessment design or assessment and accreditation requirements, you can contact the Learning Design Team or Exams & eAssessment Team.