Around half of all written HSG exams are already digital

The influence of AI on education is the subject of heated debate, but traditional pen and paper exams are still widespread at Swiss universities. The HSG is currently in the process of digitising its examination system: in 2022, four digital examinations with around 200 participants were conducted on a trial basis. In the current examination phase in January/February 2025, 143 central and decentralised examinations with around 8,000 participants will already be taken digitally – a share of 47 percent.

‘With this figure, the HSG is a pioneer in the German-speaking world,’ says Anja Thunemann, head of the HSG Competence Centre for Planning & Examinations. ’We can currently digitally examine up to 1,600 people at the same time on the HSG campus.’

This digitalisation saves tens of thousands of pages of paper and hours of work: the transport of exam sheets to the seminar rooms and back again for marking is no longer necessary. Digital exams with multiple-choice tasks to tick are also corrected automatically.

Students use their own laptops

Because students take the exams on their own laptops, the HSG does not have to purchase any additional equipment. The exams take place on-site on the HSG campus in the ‘Lockdown Browser’ programme. This blocks all other applications on students' laptops during the exam. This way, students cannot access their own notes, programmes or websites.

‘Students already work on computers most of the time during their studies and in their professional lives. So digital exams are also more realistic,’ says Enis Redzepi, Digital Exams Project Leader at the HSG.

Digital exams also make new formats possible: it is conceivable, for example, to analyse videos during an exam or to listen to spoken texts. Digital is particularly popular for languages: the largest digital exam session to date, in summer 2024, started with 24 language exams in one day.

Digital share to continue growing

Examinations at the HSG are special in any case. As one of the few Swiss universities, it conducts the majority of its examinations centrally, i.e. outside of the lecture period and during a fixed period of time on campus. In addition, there are decentralised examinations that lecturers independently set during the semester, with the support of the Competence Centre for Planning & Examinations.

HSG lecturers are free to choose whether they want to offer analogue or digital exams. ‘This option remains. I don't expect exams with pen and paper to be completely replaced, although the proportion of digital exams will probably increase significantly,’ says Thunemann, head of the Competence Centre for Planning & Exams.

This is probably also due to the fact that technically everything works well: the dropout rate for digital exams at the HSG has been as low as 0.44 per cent since 2022. In addition, the University Didactics Centre (HDZ) offers lecturers at the HSG training and an exchange on the topic of digital exams.

Large potential of AI

According to project manager Redzepi, the HSG surveys students and lecturers about their experiences with digital exams after each session. ‘This enables us to continuously improve our services.’ In the summer of 2024, 600 students and 30 lecturers were surveyed after the digital exam block.

Thunemann from P&P sees the main challenges for digital exams at the HSG as being the further development of the formats and the integration of artificial intelligence (AI). ‘There is still a lot of potential here for conducting and correcting exams even more efficiently, while at the same time developing attractive exam formats.’