My thoughts of World Conference on Online Learning (3) - Remote Exams

This is the third of the series of posts I am creating on my thoughts of the World Conference on Online Learning.

Other related posts can be found here
My thoughts of World Conference on Online Learning (1) - Our presentation
My thoughts of World Conference on Online Learning (2) - Meeting the pioneers

I attended the presentation Online Proctoring: Experimentation of remote examination in E-learning programmes by Dr. Pierre Beust (Université de Caen Normandie) and Associate Professor Sabine Bottin-Rousseau (Université Pierre et Marie Curie) and I was very interested by their research.

At University College of Estate Management (UCEM), we have a large number of international students (about one third) and UCEM holds examination centres around the world. But still some of our students have to travel, find accommodation and face the stressful exam conditions in an environment (or even a country) they are not used to. UCEM is looking at ways of making online examinations possible; therefore this presentation was of great interest to me.

The presentation introduced two case studies;  ProctorU was used as the proctoring service. Some of the interesting findings were:

• Success rate same as traditional exams
• 4.9% technical problems (that blocked the exams !) - this is an issue because one student not being able to sit the exam is enough to give a bad reputation and much more work in preparing alternative papers, moderation, marking etc.
• 3% students feel a kind of intrusion in their private life - it is like someone being in your home watching over you, the webcam will show everything that happens there. If the student has to share the space where they are taking the exam with family members (due to the unavailability of a suitable other place) especially younger children, their images will also be recorded on the webcam footage. 
• 80% would take another exam or advise a friend to have home proctored exams - this means the students were happy to take anther exam in technical setting.
• 89% are satisfied and prefer to assume the technical conditions than travel to exam centre - as I said before having to travel to a different country sorting out VISA, accommodation and other logistics can be an additional stress on top of the exam stress.

The challenges of introducing remote exams also manifest in these areas:

• Legal issues (Data protection especially EU laws prohibit data being stored outside EU so need to have agreements with the service providers, Security, Privacy)
• Technology issues – public low-cost wifi access not allowing applet communication ports to work
• Language – use of chat facility (16 exams in French) - as UCEM provides education in English perhaps this may not be a big challenge for us.

There are many who oppose remote exams stating that the likelyhood of cheating is higher. But traditional exams are not cheat proof either. Cheating risk depends on feeling of cheatability of the system. If it seems easy to cheat there is more chance of students attempting it. But interestingly in the case studies it was found that

• 61% feel proctored as effectively in remote exams as in classical exams 
• Some feel more closely proctored because of the webcam 
• Proctors of ProctorU can proctor max 6 students at the same time
• Students thought they were in a one-to-one situation

I have already made connections with Pierre and Sabine and Pierre kindly shared their case study paper too. I am really looking forward to hearing more about their work and if you are also into remote exams a place to keep an eye on is OP4RE – Online Proctoring for Remote Examinations.

Online, Flipped, Blended Approach to Apprenticeship Education

I have been working with Nick Moore, Dean Learning and Teaching at University College of Estate Management (UCEM) on an exciting project, investigating UCEM's new online, flipped, blended approach to apprenticeship education.

The proposal we put forward to the World Conference on Online Learning to present our work was accepted and now we are getting ready for the presentation in Toronto (according to the conference website meaning “meeting place” in Huron Indian), Canada.

As we only have a few minutes to talk about our project, I felt it would be useful to give some background information on the project. Below is a sway presentation I created with some video clips. Here Ashley Wheaton, UCEM Principal, talks about the need for apprenticeship education and why UCEM took up this challenge. You can also hear Lynne Downey, Dean Online Education, talking about the pedagogy behind the approach UCEM took.

Looking through the draft schedule there are lot of interesting sessions with a whopping eleven parallel sessions on Monday afternoon alone! I am looking forward to participating in my first World Conference on Online Learning.

Please maximize the presentation before viewing.

Proposal accepted for the World Conference on Online Learning

I was delighted to hear from the conference committee of the World Conference on Online Learning that the proposal we put forward, Online, Flipped, Blended Approach to Apprenticeship Education: A case study of UCEM’s Surveying Technician Diploma is accepted to be presented. Well to be honest, the news came way back but it is not always so straight forward to find funding to travel such a long distance to an expensive city. I am so lucky my employer, University College of Estate Management, is kindly sponsoring us.

The proposal was put together by Nick Moore and myself. Nick is the Dean - Teaching and Learning at University College of Estate Management and had been the chief architect of the new apprenticeship programme blue print developed under the new government apprenticeship education scheme.

In this work we have adopted an action research methodology, something new to me, though I have studied it in my PhD research training. Having not previously written an action research piece, I was delighted to see that  ELESIG's #LERMOOC on EMMA had a whole section dedicated for action research.

The World Conference on Online Learning: Teaching in a Digital Age - Re-thinking Teaching & Learning http://onlinelearning2017.ca/en/is the 27th International Council for Distance Education's biennial conference. This time it is held 16-19 October 2017 in Toronto, Canada. The conference has five tracks:

• Emerging Pedagogies and Designs for Online Learning
• Expanding Access, Openness and Flexibility
• Changing Models of Assessment
• New Delivery Tools and Resources for Learning
• Re-designed Institutional Business Model

and our presentation will be under the track "Re-designed Institutional Business Model". 

Since being a PhD student researching educational technology for distance education, I thought this event was the most prestigious conference in the field of distance and online education. I am delighted that I am able to attend the conference and I look forward to learning and networking opportunity that this event will present: making new links and strengthening already existing links.

Toronto