Electronic submission, calculation and checking of laboratory practical scripts

The traditional method of manually checking and grading student laboratory practical scripts has several disadvantages: manual checking is time consum ing and therefore causes longer script turnaround times than necessary; it is labour-intensive, especially for non-uniform quantitative data; there is potential for inconsistency, and, for large student groups, a great deal o f tedium for the checker. Automation of checking such scripts has the poten tial to alleviate these disadvantages. The School of Pure and Applied Chemi stry, University of Natal, Durban, in cooperation with the School of Pharma cy and Biomolecular Sciences, University of Brighten, has adopted a procedu re to automate the checking of practicals. This manuscript describes the me thod of checking one such practical; the Level Two practical entitled Deter mination of the Effectiveness of an Extraction. This is the first in a seri es of analytical practicals and is aimed at revising neutralisation titrati ons as well as introducing the concept of solvent extraction. The practical requires a number of calculations that are time consuming for the marker t o check individually. The manuscript describes a web-based form into which students enter their r esults via the School Intranet. The students' results are downloaded by fil e transfer protocol (FTP) and imported into a Microsoft Excel(TM) spreadshe et. The spreadsheet then calculates the correct answer based upon the prima ry data used, compares them with the students', grades the students' script s and is potentially able to add educators' comments for feedback to the st udent.