The outbreak of Coronavirus (Covid-19) and the various government containment measures forced many universities across the globe to shift to online teaching and learning. As a result, assessment which ordinarily follows a pedagogical approach of face-face classroom-based practices and procedures, moved to online, - a novel practice for many academics across disciplines. Such shift igniting debates among scholars around assessments quality, performance outcome and integrity. From both academics and students’ perspectives, the aim of this paper is to systematically review, critically evaluate, and understand the relationship between online assessments and its performance outcome in safeguarding quality and academic integrity. Applying a mixed method approach, data will be collected from students and academics in selected universities in Nigeria and South Africa. It is hoped that the findings of the study paves way to strengthen existing ethical values in policy and practice within the academia.

Keywords: Academic integrity, academic quality, covid-19, online assessment, performance outcome.