Present@: A virtual environment for dissertation defense

At the end of their technical studies, students have to present a final project in order to finish their degree. With this project, students prove that they have got all of the competences they should have acquired. Some competencies, such as the ability to communicate orally or the ability to argue may be evaluated during a face-to-face dissertation defense, but how to translate this evaluation scenario to a virtual environment is a challenge. This paper faces the problem of presenting dissertations in a virtual environment, to evaluate the aforementioned competences. The solution proposed, called Present@, is focused in teaching and technical dimensions, and is complemented with some materials and tutorials that help students to acquire those competences. Therefore, the paper shows Present@ as a solution to the problems that virtual universities have to face when dealing with the evaluation of final degree projects and particularly in their defense. Present@ has been tested over 131 students during six semesters and the results show that it actually helps students to acquire the desired competences in virtual environments. In addition, the analysis about the use of the tool has denoted that videos are an efficient mechanism to evaluate the ability to communicate of students and to work on transversal competencies. Some students also commented that the use of videos make the dissertation defense more natural and closer to face-to-face environments.