Blockchain in education: Verifying examinations, credits and transcripts
How blockchain can be used to validate university certificates and transcripts
An underlying problem in the higher education industry is that accreditations are awarded by central authorities. The distribution of university certificates is likewise executed by a central authority, leaving no room for transparency.
When analyzing the examination systems of universities around the world, it is easy to tell that the methodologies of examination have barely changed for centuries. Now, this has changed with COVID-19, whereby exams are increasingly shifting online.
Not only the examinations are outdated, but also the way in which transcripts are given to students. They may be used for various things, such as job applications and applications for further studies (Masters). Generally, however, they are meant to certify your achievements.
Unfortunately, the process of receiving a transcript is painfully difficult. Whenever a student would like to have a copy of their transcript, they need to apply for a copy, pay for this copy and then wait for the transcript to be sent - mostly manually via email. Why on earth is this still a thing?
More importantly: how can a person looking at the transcript (e.g. a potential employer) judge its authenticity? It’s quite easy to fake a piece of paper, a stamp and a signature - will someone seriously try to validate the exact signature and stamp? I doubt it. The same counts for certificates and diplomas.
How can blockchain technology be used to improve this?
It turns out that blockchain is a very useful tool that can be used to make the verification process more transparent. A study by Deenmahomed, Dider and Suungkur (2020) found that a system can make the assessment process more distributed and transparent.
A blockchain can be used to store a digital certificate, whereby it could account for the number of modules a student has cleared and whether these have been completed. Students would have access to these achievements and certificates in a so-called wallet. The researchers suggested that there could be a pool of administrators involved in the usage of this system, having the authority of the handling of the blockchain themselves.
How could this system look like?
The researchers of the study found that an optimal solution could consist of four parts:
A node in the blockchain network (i.e. an application). It can be installed across campus and in laboratories. The application essentially acts as a full node in the network.
An administrator dashboard for admins. This would simply create new student or academic accounts (i.e. creating new “blocks” on the blockchain)
A public web portal (acting as a node in the blockchain network). It contains a copy of the entire blockchain and acts as an interface for members to access it. This is where institutions and employers could check the validity of the transcripts, credits, certificates and / or diplomas.
A wallet for students (i.e. a mobile app). Keeping it simple, this wallet displays the credits, the transcript and certificates.
In this process, a student can locally (on campus) login using the application (i.e. node) and potentially also remotely when taking examinations, using the credentials of their wallet (their public key and private key, for example). When a student passes the exam, the credits are then sent to the student’s wallet.
Using smart contracts, the public key (i.e. the ID of their account so to speak) of a student is retrieved and matched to a student (i.e. it verifies whether the user is a student). It compares the student’s credit balance to the total number of credits required to receive a certain certificate. If the credit balance is greater than or equal to the required credit balance, a certificate is issued. This certificate can be viewed using the blockchain explorer.
Summarizing the above points, let’s take a look at the system architecture:
Source: Deenmahomed, Dider and Suungkur (2020)
How does this solve the problem?
On the one hand, students have instant access to their certificates and transcripts. They are verified within the network. This also lowers the costs and waiting time for students, saving days or even weeks by not having to wait for a manually signed and sent transcript / certificate.
On the other hand, this reduces the effort for the university as well (once the system is implemented of course). Everything happens automatically, there is no need to manually sign any documents and send them to students.
With these sorts of implementations, it would also be a fantastic way to showcase the potential of blockchain to current students. Being a part-time student myself, it still strikes me to see how little people know about blockchain technology. The only real way we can showcase its value is through applications that directly affect an individual - even if its “only” a matter of finding a better way to verify and / or issue certificates / transcripts.
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IntoEdtech covers the latest and most promising technological trends in education. Our aim is to summarise big topics in short blog posts, covering a range of technology applications in the education sector.
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Interesting stuff! Looking forward to more!