An electronic feedback tool for distance education students called ‘‘MarkIt’’

The purpose of this paper is to describe operational characteristics of ‘‘MarkIt’’, a PC-based application that provides feedback on assessment items. The application was developed to meet the need to mark a large number of assignments submitted by distance education students, and the need to coordinate and standardise the activities of several subject markers. The resultant software package incorporates features that provide students with information on the performance of their peers, plus the capacity for markers to enter detailed feedback at all stages of the marking process. It has been developed as a stand-alone application to provide maximum functionality and flexibility to users to give quick feedback to the students. Key features of the package are modules that permit generation of e-mail feedback, use of key comments across different units, retention of feedback on each student’s assessment, and a marking module.