I sat a very hard exam today, on a computer. It’s been a long time coming: for the past four years I have been sitting exams using the Optical Marking system wherein a computer counts up all my correct (HB!) pencil marks on a piece of paper, subtracts all my incorrect ones, and then calculates my score (with the help of some statistical jigerypokery which ensures that, along with my colleagues’ results, mine fits within a suitable bell-curve which makes the university look like it’s doing its job properly).
But this morning we finally did away with analogue paper and (HB!) pencils and inputted out answers directly into the computer. Seems like a good idea; if the papers are already marked by a computer then why not tell it your answers directly and save some trees? Well, I’ll tell you why not: the current systems, or at least the one purchased by my university, just aren’t up to it.
The problem is that they are just too inflexible. This morning we were sitting a timed one-hour exam on a university web-sever configured to allow us access to the questions only during an alloted period. Then the fire alarm went off. The little clocks at the bottom of our screens continued to count towards zero whilst we shuffled out into the fresh air. After twenty minutes the sirens ceased and we hastily returned to our terminals.
Now, in the days of good, old-fashioned paper exams, an invigilator would have made a note of the time and asked us to down (HB!) pencils and file calmly out of the building. On returning we could have simply resumed our guess-work with the balance of the time remaining. Not so this morning. Because the clocks couldn’t be stopped and the exam was only available on the server during the alloted examination period, we had to wait whilst someone hot-footed it up to the IT department and reset the exam timings. We were then able to resume the exam… FROM THE BEGINNING!
That’s right, we had to input all the answers we had previously entered (assuming we could remember which one’s we’d previously guessed) before we could continue with rationalising the blind stabs-in-the-dark which comprised our responses to the remaining questions.
Now, you could argue that this gave us ample opportunity to make up some time in what would have otherwise been a time-pressured exam. You would be right to do so, because that’s exactly what it did. And that is exactly why computer-based examination systems just aren’t worth the HTML code they’re written in.
I am all for computer-based exams (and saving trees, for that matter). Testing in a True/False format lends itself well to online systems, but those systems need to be as flexible, or better-still more flexible than the paper they’re replacing in order to be worth the investment. Adopting any “paperless” computer system just for the sake of it, without adequately balancing the ramifications of foregoing paper with the benefits of digitisation, is surely a recipe for disaster.
There’s a lesson in there somewhere…
0 Responses to “Medical examinations in the online world”