Following the disruption of the Covid pandemic, Jason Mangan and the technology team at the University of Auckland have delivered new capability targeting critical outcomes such as student success in remote learning, digital equity, revenue assurance, and continued operations within an environment of remote delivery. 

The innovations implemented by the team harness the positive digital steps forward stemming from the initial disruption and build sustainable strategic capability to further the learning and teaching, research, co-curricular and administrative outcomes of the university, according to Mangan.

A transformative shift to digital assessment

Learning assessment is a critical capability of any university. Whilst most large institutions have a vision for providing digital assessment at scale, paper-based examination remains the primary method globally. “Deploying an integrated solution that supports the varying complexities of questions and compliance requirements across all curricula is a major challenge,” says Mangan.

At the University of Auckland, approximately 40,000 students undertake assessment during the semester, and then sit three to four examinations. It is estimated that 13,400 reams of paper are used each semester. A significant cross-functional effort is needed to plan, manage and invigilate exams. Following each exam, the papers need to be manually collated, marked and results published. Students are required to come to campus to undertake the exams, which does not meet the flexibility needed during these disruptive times, nor the expectations of more modern delivery.

In 2021, the technology team delivered a new digital assessment capability that supports almost all examination complexities, including the capability to remotely invigilate exams either through AI technologies or live. Invigilation requirements are complex under digital examinations, due to the need to capture the environment, screen, audio and visual streams.  

Supported by a significant change program, the new digital assessment capability has been fully utilised in 2022 providing greater flexibility, efficiency, experience and sustainability outcomes.

“This represents a significant digital step forward for the university and a transformation within the critical business process areas associated with examinations and assessment,” says Mangan.

Activating University of Auckland campuses

The campus experience makes up a considerable component of both the student and staff experience. Activating the campus, post-pandemic, has been a focus area for all institutions globally.

With over 200 buildings across six campuses, the University of Auckland has a very large built environment. The ten-year period to 2020 saw a capital investment in excess of $1.5 billion into the university’s estate. Part of this investment included digital overlays to ensure new and evolving ways of working, teaching, learning, research, and collaboration are fully enabled. 

Some examples of innovation that the team has delivered or co-delivered as part of this include The Foundry, an e-Sports arena, a wayfinding solution and a Digital Twin proof of concept.

The Foundry: Together with the university's property team, Mangan and his staff created a showcase working environment, within the Newmarket Innovation Campus, as a pathfinder for the future evolution of other campus spaces. The design is centred around supporting “activity-based working” where the physical spaces are cloaked in digital capability offering great opportunities for collaboration.  The team has also recreated The Foundry in a virtual space and are working to ‘integrate’ this digital world with the physical. 

e-Sports Arena: Together with the university’s Campus Life and Property teams the technology team designed, constructed, and provisioned the University’s first e-Sports arena complete with Shout Casting capability. 

Wayfinding solution: With such a large campus, new students and staff often find themselves lost in their first month on campus. The provision of a wayfinding solution, integrated with the student app (Kahu) enables staff and students to easily navigate the campus places and spaces. “This forms a foundation for future enhancements where bookable resources will be enabled and even proactively offered, personalised to the student's need,” says Mangan.

Digital Twin: The team has undertaken a Digital Twin proof of concept to understand the potential of such a capability for the management and performance of the university’s built environment under certain scenarios. The proof of concept has focused on establishing a twin of one of the more recent faculty buildings enabling varying views of the property and plant.