What Happens When You Close the Door on Remote Proctoring? Moving Toward Authentic Assessments with a People-Centered Approach

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic made traditionally proctored in-person exams impossible. This article provides a summary of the arguments against institutional adoption of remote proctoring services with a focus on equity, an account of the decision to avoid remote proctoring on the University of Michigan-Dearborn campus, and conclusions and suggestions for other teaching and learning professionals who would like to take a similar approach. Remote proctoring services require access to technology that not all students are guaranteed to have, can constitute an invasion of privacy for students, and can discriminate against students of color and disabled students. Administrators and teaching and learning staff at the University of Michigan-Dearborn made the decision to avoid adopting remote proctoring technologies and to instead invest in instructional design staff and faculty development programming to help faculty transition to authentic assessments. Lessons learned and recommendations are provided for other educational developers or institutions who want to resist remote proctoring on their campuses.

E-Assessment in E-Learning Degrees: Comparison vs. Face-to-Face Assessment through Perceived Stress and Academic Performance in a Longitudinal Study

“…These overly positive indicators explain that most students would like to repeat remote assessment, despite the fact that the remote proctoring method initially generated enormous mistrust among students, as Silverman et al [54] have shown in their study. Once the initial uncertainty is overcome, the digital environment is reliable and safe for the student.…”

“…The remote proctoring system has generated great controversy since its use has been extended in the university sector during the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, Silverman et al [54] show in their study a summary of the arguments against institutional adoption of remote proctoring services with a focus on equity, an account of the decision to avoid remote proctoring on the University of Michigan. This software, once installed, activates the student's webcam and executes certain prior steps: a short recording of the user, a picture of the student and his ID, and a recording of the student's environment [53].…”

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

“…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.…”

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“…At an institutional level, rather than investing in simple yet costly solutions to address cheating, universities might finance centers for teaching and learning, led by pedagogical experts. At the University of Michigan-Dearborn, for example, after making a collective decision not to use online remote proctoring, the administration invested instead in instructional designers to aid faculty in the creation of authentic, or "people-centered," assessments for their remote classes (Silverman et al, 2021). Though faculty are highly valued subject-area specialists, by and large, most receive little to no training around assessment and instruction (Blouin & Moss, 2015).…”