Case Study: West Virginia University saves time and boosts student engagement with Top Hat

How Top Hat Test Helped a Chemistry Professor Save Tons of Time

West Virginia University chemistry professor Joshua Osbourn needed a better way to keep large classes prepared and accountable without spending hours printing and grading paper quizzes. With Top Hat’s Classroom and Test products, he wanted a more efficient, less paper-heavy way to assess student understanding in classes of 150 to 300 students.

Using Top Hat, Osbourn delivered low-stakes quizzes directly to students’ devices and used real-time classroom questions to keep lectures interactive. The quizzes were auto-graded, cutting grading time from 2–3 hours to 0, while also improving engagement and discouraging cheating, with 0 students found cheating on in-class quizzes.

West Virginia University

Joshua Osbourn

Associate Professor, Chemistry