Towards More Authentic Assessments: Technical Interviews as Alternatives to Traditional Exams

Traditional written exam and quiz assessments rarely represent actual experiences of practicing engineers, while other assessment modalities such as traditional homework and “take-home” exams are not robust to challenges posed by generative artificial intelligence or portals such as Chegg and Course Hero. Alternative assessments incorporating authentic professional experiences within engineering classrooms may instead be preferred. Authentic assessments can provide students with experiences that they will encounter in their careers while, at the same time, providing instructors with an opportunity to assess students’ grasp of topical engineering content. This work seeks to examine the question “how do students perceive more authentic assessments?” by documenting a “technical interview” oral midterm exam administered as a major assessment in a core Introduction to Thermal-Fluid Sciences (ITFS) engineering course. Interviews were led by the course instructor, who asked each team to respond to a previously provided prompt. After each team’s exam interview, each student on the team was anonymously surveyed regarding her or his own perceptions of the oral assessment. Broadly speaking, students indicated positive perceptions of the oral interview approach, indicating that they thought deeper about, gained a better understanding of, and learned new things about course content while preparing – more intensively as a team – for the oral exam compared to traditional exam instruments. Overall positive sentiment regarding individual student experience, enhanced learning outcomes, team dynamics, and modeling of professional engineering reality suggests that oral examinations can serve as an effective alternative and/or complement to traditional nonoral assessment instruments.