Page 14 - 2019 CXC Annual Report

CARIBBEAN EXAMINATIONS COUNCIL ANNUAL REPORT 2019

World Class Exams

Examinations Administration and Security

ELECTRONIC TESTING
No. of No. of No. of
8. In support of further adoption of e-Testing and in keeping TERRITORIES SUBJECTS TESTS SAT
with the Council’s strategy, orientation and training 2018 2019 2018 2019 2018 2019
sessions continued for new Ministry Officials and Chief CAPE® 13 15 32 32 3913 5447
Invigilators. A few onsite sessions were held in Guyana,
CSEC® 9 19 31 31 11,214 37,504
Trinidad, Barbados and Jamaica with key stakeholder
CCSLC® 3 3 6 5 666 285
groups. At the start of the May-June cycle, training
15,793 43,236
sessions were supported by online workshops and
Table 5 Distribution of e-Testing Candidates and Territories
webinars to reinforce the required procedures. Several of
the Centres and Territories which participated in e-Testing
SBA OPERATIONS
last year also requested refresher sessions this cycle.
11. The updated e-SBA system was deployed in February-
March 2019 with some minor teething problems. Some
9. There was marked improvement in the test publication
of the enhancements provided through the updated
process between the e-QBank and the e-Testing platform
application included:
this cycle. Other than a minor hiccup with the publication
a. More robust platform and better file uploading
of the CAPE® Digital Media Paper 020, all tests were
facilities;
deployed as planned and started on schedule. During
b. Better performance under low or weak bandwidth;
the May-June 2019 session, the LIVE e-Testing platform
and
performed well. Minor challenges with failed infrastructure
c. Full enforcement of profile, group and candidate
(power, internet and devices) were compensated for
controls, even while working offline.
by allocating ‘incident extra-time’ or ad hoc session
deployment. In a few cases, candidates reverted to
While the feedback was generally positive, initial
the paper examination. While the fully-offline mode
challenges were faced with some of the reports used to
was available again this session, it was not used by any
identify the required samples, along with the confirmation
territory.
messages on file uploads.
10. Table 5 shows for each examination, the distribution of
12. In order to avoid issues with unknown file formats, a short
test sessions and territories that participated in e-Testing
list of pre-defined subjects were allowed to accept Zipped-
for the May-June cycle. There was 174% increase in the
file uploads. CSEC® Electronic Document Preparation and
number of examinations sat in electronic mode over May-
Management was not one of the subjects considered.
June 2018.
As such, centres reported having to upload over twenty
individual files for each candidate in the sample. This
matter is being reviewed for the next cycle.

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