After a student had corrected a test, an instructor ran the checking program that displayed the student's answers and the correct answers on the screen for validation. If a student wished to debate the correctness of an answer, it was necessary to refer to paper versions of tests to find the relevant question; for security reasons, only coded versions of questions were kept on the computers, and these could not be read without a special program. Future versions of the checking program will display the question, the student's answer, the correct answer, and the scoring immediately after the self-correction phase.
The students' disks contained an output file for each test that showed how many questions had been correctly completed in the test. As a backup, a master sheet also contained each student's score on each test. A useful modification to subjects' disks, which would obviate the need for a master sheet, would be a program that (1) recorded the tests that had been mastered, (2) maintained a running total score after each test, and (3) recorded how many times a subject attempted each test before mastery was achieved.
Perhaps the most important aspect of the system described here is the dedication of instructors' time to the discussion room. Because enrollments far exceeded the anticipated class size, it was common for large demands to be placed on instructors in the microlaboratory, leaving the discussion room vacant during these times. This did not impede the students' performance or progress, and only rarely did they seek help outside class time, but many students mentioned that they would have preferred more discussion time. Inherent in the self-paced course is a large variation in usage times of the microlaboratory, so matching staff numbers to student demand is impossible. A possible solution to this may be to schedule testing times to provide greater streamlining (e.g., on Monday and Wednesday only test students whose surnames begin with A-L). One instructor dedicated to the discussion room would be ideal, but would be cost-inefficient on lowdemand days.
Our course was successful, and our analysis demonstrates that computers can be used as effective substitutes for proctors when personnel numbers are limited.