"Are you serious?" This exclamation was many students' reaction when they discovered that Kenneth Lachlan's Survey of Mass Communication course was supplemented only by online testing.
This, however, was not a sudden decision. Lachlan, a professor in the communications department, has had "an ongoing conversation" with the Pearson publisher (the publisher of the textbook) for over two-and-a-half years.
Last semester was the monumental first semester the online testing feature of the class was implemented, and the students in the "guinea pig class" had mixed feelings. Some, like Kelly Garofalo, A&S '12, were thrilled with the idea that tests could be taken in accordance with a student's schedule. More conscientious students were concerned with the ease with which classmates could cheat. The question remains, however: Is online testing beneficial?
From a teaching standpoint, Lachlan explains that online testing allows him to devote less time in the classroom to evaluation. In previous years, the Survey of Mass Communication course incorporated three exams and three review sessions into the class schedule. With tests now taken on the student's own time, professors like Lachlan can spend more time doing what they are paid to do: teach.
"[There is] about 20 percent more reading in the class than there was before, and having the evaluation take place outside the classroom allows for us to do that," Lachlan says. Students are now exposed to more chapters in the textbook than they were before in the same amount of time as previous years.
Not everything is perfect, however. Lachlan confesses to the many little kinks and technological glitches experienced first semester and assures that there are a whole new set this semester, which he admits is a possible downside to using a system like this.
Problems include compatibility issues from browser to browser, security settings that can cause "headaches" as Lachlan laments, as well as variability from Windows to Macs to Linux.
"The traditional exam and evaluation format has been used for hundreds of years [and] is tried and true," Lachlan says. "There are still some things to iron out, and that's maybe part of the downside, if there is a downside."
But another plus to online testing is that it is easier to manage the course grade-wise. Grades now appear instantly once the test is taken. With the old system, Lachlan had to send out 200 individual e-mails or a single mass e-mail to the entire class. Upon receiving the e-mail, a student had to search through it for his or her Eagle ID number for the exam score. This required, as Lachlan explains, "hours of data entry and it was less than secure."
Some may still wonder if cheating is an issue. Lachlan says that having someone take the exam for someone else is "no more difficult than having someone write a paper for you," a practice that is often found to have few employers.
There are, however, technical safeguards in place to make cheating very difficult. "You can randomly select items from a larger test bank and calibrate them so they're approximately of the same difficulty, instead of giving everyone the same exam," Lachlan says. "[You can] give everyone a different exam that's about as tough."
Time constraints also pose threats to potential cheaters. If a test is limited to an hour, there is the possibility of looking up answers in a book. But there may not be enough time to finish the exam, which puts a student in a worse position than getting a few choice answers correct.
Bonnie Jefferson, a professor in the communications department, expresses concern about online testing, stating that she's not sure how it can be controlled. "There's a whole bunch of questions I have about the whole thing … [Online testing] is something that never would have even occurred to me." For many teachers, online testing is an abstract idea. Many professors are not against it, but rather have never considered it before.
Feedback from the student body is also an important indicator of the benefits of online testing. Benjamin McDonald, A&S '12, feels as though it has helped him take more responsibility for his education. "The online nature of [Survey of Mass Communication] made me much more self dependent because it was up to me to do the work and allowed me to do it on my schedule," he says.
Freedom to take online tests at any hour of the day before a specific deadline is something desired by many students. But Jesse Francois, A&S '11, disagrees. "I feel that if everything is online, students will not pay as close attention to the material." When a student has only a 10-question multiple choice quiz to take online, it makes sense that he or she would skim through the material just to find the answers. And with music and Facebook, Francois is concerned with the multi-tasking that students do. "They won't give 100 percent of their attention to the online test if there are other distractions present."
While this may not be true for all, most students voice the opinion that online testing is a possible thoroughfare to an "easy A." Sha-Kayla Crockett, A&S '09, who experienced online testing in the form of weekly biology quizzes, feels that "in terms of getting the entire class involved, which consisted of a little more than 200 students, I found it to be an effective tool, but in terms of academic credibility and testing the academic progress of students individually, I thought online testing couldn't possibly be an effective measuring tool."
In the face of online testing, students can resort to discussing questions with their peers or searching through the textbook or through Google for answers. But does this diminish the progress online testing brings to education today? Some may argue yes, while others may beg to differ.
Online testing is but a small stem of a broader issue: technology in and around the classroom, and more generally, in the daily lives of students. From lessons being aired on podcasts, to iClickers in BC and other universities' classrooms, this generation has witnessed an outpouring of technology.
But how did this generation become the technologically-savvy generation? Looking back on anyone's childhood born after 1981, after the first computer had arrived on the scene, when has anyone not been exposed to technology? By the late 1980's and early 1990's, most households owned at least one computer.
Video games are a frequent pastime, and TV shows are a constant source of entertainment. It is hard for this generation to fathom a time when computers weren't a necessity. This generation relies on technology, and future generations could even more.
The methods of education are changing. Video cassettes are no longer used for language lab recordings, clickers are being used to test the absorption and understanding of material presented to students in class, and even written exams are being phased out. The University of Phoenix Online is a university that has no tangible walls; A degree is literally a click away. Some may wonder if this step in education is heading in the right direction.
"Are you serious?" shouts a student from the back of Lachlan's class. "I'm so happy that everything is online!"
For many students, online testing is a relief. The phrase "This will be a breeze" may cross the minds of students entering a class of this nature. Others may worry of the repercussions of cheating and the merit and honesty of every individual in the class with the onset of online testing. It is important to realize, however, that embracing technology may be what the American educational system must do in order to stay competitive in the future.
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