A simple prediction:
Use of AI by university students has already seen a return of focus on exams as the key way of testing student abilities & learning;
for courses that include projects, long-form research reports or dissertations, we will now see the expansion of the use of the in-person verbal examination.
While this has always been used for PhDs, the use will now likely reach down into assessment of any undergraduate long-form work, expanding staff work-loads (again).
@ChrisMayLA6 though to be fair, the kind of communication skills you need for that kind of examination are often sorely lacking in people I interview in my line of work.
Appreciate need for the resourcing to be there, but if this led to supporting young people to be able to articulate complex ideas verbally, essentially on the fly, then that would be beneficial.
I examined over twenty PhDs during by professorial career, and the range of communication skills on offer varied widely, with only later on universities finally formally supporting candidates to develop the specific skills needed to defend their thesis..... so certainly, I agree with your point!
Yes, but...
As my (civil engineering) tutor told me early on "you don't need to know the contents of every book, you need to know how to use the index and find the book, & then understand what's in it" We had (some) open book exams as a result, but they were much harder than the regular ones.
In IT, search engines & AI do the same role, so assuming they're not going away, knowing how to use them effectively is just as important.
Big caveat: for some subjects
@ChrisMayLA6 well done you encouraging the teaching of those skills.
But those skills are one of the core products of private schools. So it's almost inevitable that an oral examination system will privilege the privately-schooled students.
I don't have any alternative to propose. But it's a big downside of the shift.
Well, in my in-person sessions (being a bit of a class warrior), those with clear private school training (and at my top 10 uni there were plenty of those) got a lot harder time of it than the expected, while I operated a form of affirmative action with those who were less well trained but had just as sharp minds, to tease out their insights; of course the private school types were surprised when I just didn't roll over in front of their (often empty) verbal dexterity
@ChrisMayLA6 Wonderful! That's really great to hear.
But I fear that your determination to see behind the expensive self-confidence may not be universal.
And I retired five years ago so have been not operating my under-the-counter affirmative action since.... which I miss (one of the few things I miss about working in a university; teaching the UGs, which for the most part was a joy)
Emeritus Prof Christopher May
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