Assessment in ‘survival mode’: student and faculty perceptions of online assessment practices in HE during Covid-19 pandemic

Abstract

This paper presents a cross-sectional study that demonstrates how King Abdulaziz University has responded to the lockdown imposed by the Ministry of Education in Saudi Arabia due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The purpose of this study was to examine the perceptions of students and faculty towards assessment that had to take place online due to physical or social distancing rules and lockdowns. A descriptive mixed-method study was conducted with two different self-administered questionnaires that were developed for students and faculty, respectively. A total of 547 responses were received from undergraduate students and 213 from faculty. The main finding suggests the need for a multilevel approach to the problems of cheating and plagiarism, including raising student awareness and ethics, training teachers to detect cheating methods, and institutions activating their code of practice and applying severe sanctions on those who engage in such practices.

EFL secondary school teachers’ conceptions of online assessment in emergency remote teaching: A phenomenographic study

“…They cannot control academic integrity and do not know how to assess the students' affective and psychomotor skills due to their limited online assessment literacy. The findings corroborate the previous studies by Guangul et al (2020) and Meccawy et al (2021), revealing that cheating and plagiarism become prevalent in online assessment in ERT. Meccawy et al (2021) proposed a multilevel approach as the strategy to overcome academic dishonesty.…”

“…The findings corroborate the previous studies by Guangul et al (2020) and Meccawy et al (2021), revealing that cheating and plagiarism become prevalent in online assessment in ERT. Meccawy et al (2021) proposed a multilevel approach as the strategy to overcome academic dishonesty. The strategies are developing students' academic integrity, providing creative and meaningful tasks that assess students' holistic skills, rather than information recall, and giving extensive training for teachers related to various assessment tasks, academic integrity, and assessment security.…”

“…However, assessment challenges in online distance environments become more critical due to the limited interactions to monitor the students directly and provide effective feedback (Rovai, 2000). Moreover, when the instructional design is not prepared well due to the rapid and unprecedented transitions, assessing students in online remote situations has endangered significant challenges in the practices, such as the issues of cheating and plagiarism (Guangul et al, 2020;Meccawy et al, 2021). Ninković et al (2021) contend that teachers must possess sufficient assessment literacy and technological knowledge to design and conduct an effective online assessment.…”

“…A number of studies have discovered some typical issues in online assessment during pandemic Covid-19. For instance, Meccawy et al (2021) reported the result of an online survey distributed to 547 undergraduate students. It reveals that the biggest problem of online assessment during pandemic situations is students' low academic integrity.…”

“…They found that students' workload and teachers' online readiness become other concerns in online assessment during ERT. Those unfavorable circumstances can decrease the primary function of online assessment as the medium to assist students in achieving their learning goals (Guangul et al, 2020;Meccawy et al, 2021).…”