Driven by technological innovations, continuous digital expansion has transformed fundamentally the landscape of modern higher education, leading to discussions about evaluation techniques. The emergence of generative artificial intelligence raises questions about reliability and academic honesty regarding multiple-choice assessments in online…

Assessment and institutional research offices have too much data and too little time. Standard reporting often crowds out opportunities for innovative research. Fortunately, advancements in data science now offer a clear solution. It is equal parts technique and philosophy. The first and easiest step is to modernize data work. This column…

This paper contributes to the ongoing efforts aimed at enhancing Outcome-Based Education (OBE) assessment methodologies by addressing some critical gaps and exploring new solutions. Our work focuses on two main areas: firstly, this study proposes an improved assessment method for OBE. It refines traditional approaches by classifying course…

Teachers, examiners and assessment experts know from experience that some candidates annotate exam questions. "Annotation" includes anything the candidate writes or draws outside of the designated response space, such as underlining, jotting, circling, sketching and calculating. Annotations are of interest because they may evidence…

Arithmetic fluency is regarded as a foundational math skill, typically measured as a single construct with pencil-and-paper-based timed assessments. We introduce a tablet-based assessment of single-digit fluency that captures individual trial response times across several embedded experimental contrasts of interest. A large (n = 824) cohort of…

In recent years, the application of explainability techniques to automated essay scoring and automated short-answer grading (ASAG) models, particularly those based on transformer architectures, has gained significant attention. However, the reliability and consistency of these techniques remain underexplored. This study systematically investigates…

Overview: This systematic review explores the utilization of artificial intelligence (AI) for assessment, grading, and feedback in higher education. The review aims to establish how AI technologies enhance efficiency, scalability, and personalized learning experiences in educational settings, while addressing associated challenges that arise due…

Multistage adaptive testing (MST) has become popular in the testing industry because the research has shown that it combines the advantages of both linear tests and item-level computer adaptive testing (CAT). The previous research efforts primarily focused on MST design issues such as panel design, module length, test length, distribution of test…

Automated essay scoring (AES), where natural language processing is applied to score written text, can underpin educational resources in blended and distance learning. AES performance has typically been reported in terms of correlation coefficients or agreement statistics calculated between a system and an expert human examiner. We describe the…

The purpose of this study is to describe and evaluate a multilingual automated essay scoring (AES) system for grading essays in three languages. Two different sentence embedding models were evaluated within the AES system, multilingual BERT (mBERT) and language-agnostic BERT sentence embedding (LaBSE). German, Italian, and Czech essays were…

Item compromise has long posed challenges in educational measurement, jeopardizing both test validity and test security of continuous tests. Detecting compromised items is therefore crucial to address this concern. The present literature on compromised item detection reveals two notable gaps: First, the majority of existing methods are based upon…

The rapid spread of the COVID-19 pandemic in the first half of 2020 disrupted and changed higher education across the world, and into the future. Campuses were shut down, almost overnight. International and State borders were closed and business models that relied heavily on high-paying international students collapsed. University leaders and…

The systematic literature review (1) investigates whether 'serious games' provide a viable solution to the limitations posed by traditional high-stakes performance assessments and (2) aims to synthesize game design principles for the game-based performance assessment of professional competencies. In total, 56 publications were included in the…

Adaptive online learning can be realized through the evaluation of the learning process. Monitoring and supervising learners' cognitive levels and adjusting learning strategies can increasingly improve the quality of online learning. This analysis is made possible by real-time measurement of learners' cognitive levels during the online learning…

Thurstonian forced-choice modeling is considered to be a powerful new tool to estimate item and person parameters while simultaneously testing the model fit. This assessment approach is associated with the aim of reducing faking and other response tendencies that plague traditional self-report trait assessments. As a result of major recent…