Online Proctoring: Adding Human Values to the Equation

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic led to an accelerated implementation of digital solutions, such as online proctoring. In this paper we discuss how the use of an ethical matrix may influence the way in which digital solutions are applied. To initiate an ethical discussion, we conducted an online workshop with educators, examiners, controllers, and students to identify risks and opportunities of online proctoring for various stakeholders. We used the Ethical Matrix to structure the meeting. We compared the outcome of the workshop with the outcomes of a proctoring software pilot by examiners. We found that the two approaches led to complementary implementation criteria. The ethical session was less focused on making things work and more on transparency about conditions, processes, and rights. The ethical session also concentrated more on the values of all involved rather than on fraud detection effectiveness.

Key Factors in the Implementation of E-Proctoring in the Spanish University System

“…The "pressure from customers" factor was the factor shown to exert the most influence on the rest of the factors, which focuses on the pressure from students when Spanish universities accept and implement this tool. This was verified during this period, where the students refused its definitive implementation when Spanish universities began to opt for this tool as a method of remote supervision, alleging social, legal and ethical implications, such as the inability to have the necessary resources for its use and the violation of privacy [117][118][119][120][121]. This led them to finally opt for videoconferences with active audio and video [5,6] as a supervision method, which did not remedy the problems alleged by the students, but reduced the need for resources and the violation of privacy.…”

“…With regard to the initiatives from the universities or the government that normalize the recording of students in the development of evaluations and the monitoring of their computers, facts that may lead to ethical problems and possible conflicts with the European standards of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), as can be seen in previous studies [112][113][114][115][116][117][118][119][120][121][122][123][124][125][126]; the distributors of these e-proctoring systems have already proposed guidelines in this regard that allow them to comply with said regulations [127], and the responsibility would fall on the universities to provide their approval of these guidelines or indicate if they see other more fitting ones.…”

Ethical reasoning methods for ICT: the technical report

“…This is done by organising design review workshops where the participants identify positive, neutral, and negative impacts that the ICT has on the values and stakeholders, writing a short explanation in the corresponding matrix cells and, optionally colouring the cells with green, white or red background, respectively. The method utility has been tested in the context of two projects developing a health check app and an online internship coaching tool [61], and also during the redesign of an online exam proctoring tool [62]. The results show that it allows identifying relevant impacts of the ICT on stakeholder values and inform the engineering of requirements and design alternatives that incorporate counter-measure for the negative impacts.…”