2 research outputs found
Rise of the machines? The evolving role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies in high stakes assessment
Our world has been transformed by technologies incorporating artificial
intelligence (AI) within mass communication, employment, entertainment and
many other aspects of our daily lives. However, within the domain of education, it
seems that our ways of working and, particularly, assessing have hardly changed at
all. We continue to prize examinations and summative testing as the most reliable
way to assess educational achievements, and we continue to rely on paper-based
test delivery as our modus operandi. Inertia, tradition and aversion to perceived
risk have resulted in a lack of innovation (James, 2006), particularly so in the area
of high-stakes assessment. The summer of 2020 brought this deficit into very
sharp focus with the A-level debacle in England, where grades were awarded,
challenged, rescinded and reset. These events are potentially catastrophic in terms
of how we trust national examinations, and the problems arise from using just one
way to define academic success and one way to operationalize that approach
to assessment. While sophisticated digital learning platforms, multimedia
technologies and wireless communication are transforming what, when and how
learning can take place, transformation in national and international assessment
thinking and practice trails behind. In this article, we present some of the current
research and advances in AI and how these can be applied to the context of
high-stakes assessment. Our discussion focuses not on the question of whether
we should be using technologies, but on how we can use them effectively to
better support practice. An example from one testing agency in England using a
globally popular test of English that assesses oral, aural, reading and written skills
is described to explain and propose just how well new technologies can augment
assessment theory and practice