ONLINE UNIVERSITY EXAMINATION PRACTICES DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC

Abstract

Among the many challenges a higher education institution faced during the COVID-19  pandemic was the abrupt transition to conduct examinations from physical to online  settings. Administrators and academics alike had to re-think and re-plan matters related to  logistics, guidelines and procedures, assessment modes and the technological  infrastructure supporting the surge of usage. In this study, we disseminated post online  examination surveys in two different semesters to students in one of the universities in Brunei Darussalam. Data that were analysed revealed several insights from the students,  such as the different platforms used to communicate with their lecturers when problems  arose, rating the Internet connection and also their online examination experiences. There  were many suggestions put forth in terms of how to build improvements for the betterment  of conducting online assessments, and surprisingly, majority preferred not to have the  online examinations but to replace them with 100% coursework instead. Meanwhile, the  overall conclusions collated, such as reviewing the examination time and questions and  providing feedback to faculties, served as the best way forward for further action plans for  the university. These findings were important as it helped the university management team  to strategise the best mechanisms to help smooth the transition for all parties involved.