Automated peer-assisted assessment of programming skills

An "add-on" to the Coursemarker/sup /spl copy// programming environment is described that permits the use of student peer-support and peer-assessment. The students having submitted their own assignments for automatic checking by the system are required to peer-comment the programmes of a selection of their peers. This paper reports on the findings of the initial study, and suggests methods that can be utilised to automatically qualitatively assess the peer-marker's ability in performing the marking process.