On-Demand Exam in

Indira Gandhi National Open University

ByDr. Oum Prakash Sharma

National Centre for Innovations in Distance Education

Existing System of Exam• Six monthly Term End Exam in June & Dec.

• Exam in a fixed time frame on dates pre-decided by the university,

• Many students don’t get leave during this period,

• Some students have their other commitments,

• For overseas students timings may be different,

• Students may not be ready or prepared to appear in Term end exams

• This way they may miss at least six months

On-Demand Exam : An Overview• learners friendly innovative scheme of examination• more flexible & independent of the traditional fixed time frame• no need to wait for the six monthly term end exam• choice of deciding the dates of exam lies with students as per

their preparation• different sets of question papers generated on the day of

examination• online delivery of question papers to the Exam Centres/RCs• encrypted storage of the question papers• decryption by a specific software only by the RD• three layer password protection system• on-line registration for OD-Exam• on-line issue of Hall Ticket automatically• on-line payment of registration fee for OD- Exam• on-line clarification of doubts and on-line status of registration• exam under web based CCTV at the OD- Exam Centres• least possibility of malpractices or unfair means• may reduce load on the term end exam in future.

Operational Steps for On-Demand Exam

Winex Software forGenerating Q. Papers

by NCIDE

Development ofQuestion Bank byConcerned faculty

Online Registration For OD-Exam

Generation & encryption of Q.Papers on the day of Exam

Conduct of OD-Exam at the selected Exam Centres/RCs

Evaluation of Answer Books by the RC

Processing of Awards & Declaration of Result by SE Division

Decryption & printing of Q. Papers by the RD on the day of Exam

Different Modules in ODExam

• Registration Module for students• Exam Centre Module• Question Bank Module• Question Paper Module

Registration ModuleEligibility • Any registered and bonafied student of IGNOU who has completed

the minimum eligibility period and has valid registration • Fulfils other criteria of eligibility for taking the examination such

as submission of assignments, attendance in practical classes etc.

Process of Registration • Registration for OD-Examination is on-line • Student is required to fill up his enrolment number only in the

registration form• Remaining data is taken from data base automatically• Examination date and exam centre are allotted automatically on-

line• Hall Ticket to the examinees is issued On-line onlyRegistration fee • Can be paid through credit card on-line or through the bank draft

or cash challan• If the examination fee is submitted by Bank Draft/bank chalaln, an

Acknowledgment Receipt is issued on-line • In such cases, registration is confirmed only after receiving the

bank draft

Access Control System For students– Open access for on-line registration only for eligible students– Restricted access for registered students through unique Reg. No

allotted automatically• For print out of Hall Ticket, Print out of Ack. Receipt• Check status of registration, See result

Inbuilt Check Points• Only valid student can register for OD-Exam

• least possibility of any error in filling on-line registration form as the student has to mention only enrolment number

• can not register for OD-Exam in the courses all-ready passed• Student with wrong enrolment number can not register• can not register on one exam date for more than one course• For the same course re-registration can be made only after the

result of previous exam is declared

Registration Module

Exam Centre ModuleEach RC is given Access to the EC Module through a unique ID and password. Password may be altered by RDEach RC can • update the status of receipt of Bank Draft/Challan and confirm

registration• inform students about the confirmation of their registration• download and print date wise exam data of the confirmed

students at their centre• print date wise attendance sheet and award list of their

registered candidates• submit online attendance on the exam date itself, so that SED

may know the number of the students appearing on that date at all the RCs

• download question paper in encrypted form • print marking scheme for each question paper one day after the

examination

Question Bank ModuleDevelopment of Question Bank • Course wise blue print and QP Design are developed in consultation with

the faculty• Large number of questions are being developed for Question banks • QB is being developed both in Hindi and English• Each question is coded - course/block/unit/section/type/marks/difficulty

level/sl No.

Moderation and Finalization of Question Bank• The question items are computerized, proof read and edited • Question bank is got reviewed and moderated by a group of subject

experts from the approved list • Finalised question bank and sample papers of each course are got

approved by the Prog. Coordinator• The finalized Question Bank is converted into Data Base

No Access to the Question Bank• course-wise question bank in a password protected computer in Encrypted

form at HQ• Planning to give online Authoring Access to the Faculty/experts

Question Paper ModuleGeneration of Question Papers • Winex Software generates different sets of question papers on

the day of exam• Questions are selected randomly from each cell of the question

bank as per the blue print • Question papers are encrypted automatically and stored in the

server at HQs• An unique password for each day is generated automatically

and conveyed to the RD concerned for decrypting the QPs • RD can access to the Encrypted QPs for downloading at RC on

the day of exam• All question papers are parallel and equivalent in terms of

objectives, types of questions, difficulty level and coverage of content

• No duplicate question paper can be generated for the same course for same student

• Marking scheme for each question paper is generated after 24 hours

Question Paper ModuleDelivery of Question Paper to the Exam Centre (RC)• Four unique sets of question papers are generated for each

course to be used at each RC separately.• This question paper are encrypted at the time of generation

and saved in hard disc. So, the person who will generate QP will not be able to read it.

• RD downloads question paper in encrypted form • The encrypted question paper is decrypted only by a specific

software • HQ generates separate password for each RC for each exam

date• RD decrypts the encrypted question papers using this

passwords • The decrypted question paper can not be saved in hard disc.• Nobody can change contents of Question Paper • RD can print marking scheme for each generated question

paper only one day after the examination

Unique Features of Question Paper• Each question paper has

– Unique QP Code having date & time of generation of QP etc– 8 digit unique bar code generated randomly– Coverage from all the blocks as per the design of QP– Bilingual questions

• No two QPs will have same set of questions• The unit from which question is picked up, is blocked so that no

similar question is taken from the same unit

Summary of Security Features• Only an eligible student will be able to register for On-Demand

Examination• Each RC will have a unique ID and password to enter RC module

and access the information concerning ODE related to their centre.

• RC can not access the data pertaining to the students of other RCs.

• For downloading question paper RD has to login again with another login ID and password.

• By entering this login ID and password RD can download the encrypted question paper.

• For decryption of question papers each RC will use a third password which will be generated by H.Q. for each exam and each RC. at the time of question paper generation.

• So, there are three levels of security regarding printing of Question Paper

• No body can open the QP generation software unless he/she knows password

• The question paper can be decrypted and previewed only through the software developed by NCIDE.

• QP can not be saved in the decrypted form• Each QP has as bar code and a QP code consisting of date and

time of generation of question paper

Conduct of On-Demand Exam

• OD-Exam is conducted at selected RCs on the scheduled dates under web based CCTV cameras

• Initially frequency of OD-Exam is once in a week on Friday• A vigilance of exam centres is be kept by Headquarters also through

Web Cameras • RDs may appoint external qualified invigilators for the supervision of

the of the OD-Exam

Evaluation of Answer Books

• RDs to maintain the secrecy of the answer books after completion of the examination Evaluation of Answer Books

• Evaluation of the answer books to be done periodically at the RC level

• After evaluation awards to be dispatched to the SE Division.

Processing of Awards and Declaration of the Result

• Awards received from the RCs, to be processed by the SE Division • Result to be declared by the SE Division at the earliest

Overall Benefits of ODExam SchemeFor the students• can appear in exam as per their preparation• choice of exam data and exam centre lies with the students• need not to waits for via monthly term end exams.• Need not to take long leave for appearing in TEE, especially for the

working students• Another chance for those where maximum period is completing or those

who have failed in examFor the Teachers• No need to prepare the QP again and again• Reduction in the work load of setting QP, Assignments etc• Possibility of Improvement in the result of their studentsFor the University • ultimate cost reduction in getting QP prepared• Improvements in the credibility of the examination system of University• Reduction in the frequent dependence on the external experts for paper

setting and moderation etc.• For small enrolment courses exercise of paper setting may be avoided

which is very costly

Thanks