Background and purpose Viva voce (VIVA) exams are resource intensive, can be prone to inter-rater reliability issues, and induce anxiety in many students. Costs, reliability, validity, and student welfare have been targeted for VIVA re-design. The objective of this study is to design and assess if a less labour-intensive approach to VIVA exams is acceptable to students, reducing student anxiety, whilst maintaining authenticity of the assessment.

Educational activity and setting The School of Pharmacy and Medical Sciences (Griffith University) delivers undergraduate and postgraduate pharmacy degrees, which contain multiple VIVAs. We have designed and implemented a modified VIVA called the technology-assisted VIVA exam (TaVIVA) utilising remote recording, retrospective marking, and pre-recorded multimedia delivered questions to test student acceptability, impact on student anxiety, and inform potential delivery as a summative assessment.

Findings Student responses were overwhelmingly positive, reporting satisfaction with the TaVIVA. There was strong agreement that the school should continue to develop the TaVIVA. Students perceived that it was fairer than traditional VIVAs and less anxiety inducing. However, students indicated that the traditional VIVA was more authentic and that they eventually need to conduct a VIVA in the presence of an assessor.

Summary The TaVIVA is an innovative assessment approach with potential benefits over the traditional VIVA, including facilitation of assessment consistency and reductions in student anxiety. We postulate that the TaVIVA is a useful and valid means of scaffolding student performance in VIVA assessment.