How We Helped a Canadian Educational Organization Combine Copilot and Power Automate to Simplify Student Assessment

About the Client

The client is one of the largest not-for-profit educational organizations in Canada. The organization supports children from the minorities and other disadvantaged sections of the community, through their K-12 education journey. The organization is headquartered in Edmonton, and offers services across the province of Alberta, including major cities like Calgary, Lethbridge and Red Deer.

The Challenges with Student Assessment

The organization has scaled up recently, adding a significant number of students within the past few years. However, the existing team was finding it hard to keep up with the rise in demand, especially when it came to student assessment. Therefore, they needed an efficient way to generate test questions and to assess the answers in an accurate way.

They were looking at options to automate the solution. Here, they encountered several challenges.

• The questions should align with the syllabus and maintain appropriate difficulty levels
• Accurately processing handwritten answers through digital means
• Making the process easier for educators, who have varying levels of technical skills
• Exporting the results in appropriate formats.

Microsoft Copilot and Power Automate – The Perfect Solution to Their Problems

After a detailed discussion with the senior management, and engaging with various stakeholders, the team at Evolvous were able to identify Microsoft Copilot and Power Automate as the ideal solution to their problems. We conceptualized an integrated solution which built on the capabilities of both the platforms.

Here are some of the reasons why the two platforms were chosen:

• Power Automate provided a low-code automation option, which allowed you to automate the entire process without needing significant technical knowledge.
• Microsoft Copilot, on the other hand, made it easier to analyze the answers, even if they were handwritten.
• Copilot also made it easier for the educators and supervisors to interact with the system in natural conversational language, without relying on coding.

How Did the Integrated Solution Work?

The client wanted the system to be efficient and yet easy-to-use for the entire team. Therefore, we optimized the overall workflow of the integrated solution to make it fast, accurate and simplified. Here is how the overall process works

• When the educators want to create a test, they log into the portal with their credentials.
• They accessed the custom Copilot agent that we built. Instructions are given to the agent in simple plain text prompts. This generally included the topic, the number of questions, the difficulty levels etc.
• The Copilot agent created the test, and the Power Automate flow is triggered.
• Power Automate automatically delivered the test to the candidates.
• Once the candidate completed the course, and the test was submitted, Power Automate flow automatically notified the educators.
• Power Automate and Copilot automatically assessed the test results based on set parameters. Notifications are again sent to the educators, requesting them to scrutinize the answers.
• After scrutiny, the test results were automatically sent to the students in appropriate formats.

The Process We Followed to Implement the Integrated Solution

We focused on minimizing the disruption to the system. Therefore, we followed an optimized process. Here are some of the key steps that we followed:

Needs Assessment : We started the process by understanding the needs of the client. Based on the needs, we started the planning process.

Planning : Depending on the needs, we started the planning process where we developed a prototype for the solution to make the client realize the impact of the solution.

Setting Up Copilot : We started to develop the Copilot agent. After the agent was built, we trained the agent on the unique processes and relevant syllabi.

Setting Up Power Automate : Once the Copilot agent was setup, we started to develop the Power Automate flow.

Integration : After the two systems were developed independently, we integrated the two together. We also integrated it with the existing systems that were already in place for the client.

Testing : We rigorously tested the system, and all identified issues were immediately rectified.

Going Live : After the system was successfully tested, we deployed the system to the live environment.

The Impact of the Solution

After the solution was successfully deployed, the client was able to see significant improvements to their overall assessment process. Here are some of the key results that the solution was able to achieve successfully

The questions aligned with the syllabus and the desired difficulty levels maintained.

With the power of AI, we accurately process handwritten answers.

Since both Copilot and Power Automate were low code applications, it made the process easier for educators

The test results were automatically exported in the desired formats as requested by the team.