Automated Assessment for Databases Units

Abstract

With ever-growing class-sizes, automated assessment can be an extremely valuable tool in higher education. In this paper, we present our tool for automatically assessing SQL programming and reflect on five years of its use. We highlight some of the changes and challenges we have encountered as well as lessons learned. Our tool has proven successful in both its primary goal and in secondary goals such as encouraging student participation. Since its inception it has grown incrementally and been adapted for other contexts. It is now undergoing a major overhaul to expand its remit to include elements of database design and theory. We will discuss how this is being done and how we are aiming to construct a single, integrated assessment tool. Ultimately, the tool could be adapted to other contexts as well and our aim is to raise awareness of the issues facing automated assessment and encourage its adoption.