In 1994, the Department of Mathematics and statistics did a large-scale redesign of the calculus curriculum. The three-course calculus sequence was redesigned around the concept "calculus reform," meaning that greater emphasis was placed on problem-solving, relating calculus to the real world, and understanding key ideas. The price of this new emphasis was that practice of mathematical computation was squeezed out, because only a fixed amount of course time was available. This problem was solved by creating a proficiency-learning exam on basic computational skills, called a gateway exam, as one part of the course. Our model was the Gateway Exams given at the University of Michigan, in which a battery of paper tests are administered and graded by teams of graduate teaching assistants. We felt that this was an ideal situation for a web-based approach and designed an on-line system to give a Gateway Exam in Calculus I (Orr & Lewis, 2000).

This web-based program developed by John Orr, Professor of Mathematics and Statistics, offered interactive, flexible, 24/7, web-based assessment. From that point it became apparent that this Educational Diploma program had the potential to serve the needs of a wide variety of courses beyond mathematics. By the academic year 2000-2001, the software was being used in more than 30 courses and was used by more than 8500 students.

In 2001, UNL has partnered with an established educational software company, Brownstone Learning, to further develop the system as the EDU system

The current EDU system

• Delivers homework, quizzes, tests, and tutorial sessions over the web. Questions are grade by the software so students get immediate feedback on their work.
• Creates multiple versions of the same assignment, so students can work and re-work question sets until they achieve proficiency.
• Performs intelligent grading of free-response mathematical and numerical responses. When students enter formulas , the system recognizes the different ways the correct answer may be represented, and when the student enters numeric quantities the system recognizes the equivalence of appropriate physical units.
• Offers an open text-based structure for testbanks and easy incorporation of applets, graphics, and animations, and it permits a wide variety of question styles (fill-in-the-blank, numeric, clickable image).
• Provides a vital grading function. The human resources are not available for creating, administering, and hand-grading the huge quantity of assignments involved in implementing a proficiency-based pedagogy for large lecture classes.
• Offers an alternative to limited campus lab resources by using the internet computer grading.