At the end of an exam, completed answer papers are collected and the process of exam paper scanning begins. This involves digitising candidate responses, verifying scanned images, and submitting responses for marking.
There are scanning options to suit deployments of all sizes.
The first option involves the on-site deployment of a centralised TeleForm system scaled to meet your volumes. Staff will collect completed answer sheets at the end of the exam and feed them into a high-speed document scanner to begin script capture, processing, and verification.
Secondly, if you opt for our document scanning services, completed exam papers can be shipped to our scanning bureau where we will scan and process them accordingly.
Thirdly, for larger deployments covering multiple worldwide centres, an innovative distributed scanning client called eScan can be deployed to scan candidate responses via a Click-Once installer on the web portal.
eScan is a web-distributable scanning application that provides users with scanning, reconciliation, error rectification and secure transmission of scanned image batches for further processing.
Some of the key features of the eScan app include:
eScan automatically deploys over the web with a Click-Once installation. It enforces scan configurations to ensure consistency, minimise setup time, and minimise user training.
eScan validates image quality through a combination of page identifying marks and brightness scales as well as checking page sizes, readability, and answer paper type in real-time as the images are scanned.
This reconciliation and image validation phase results in markers only viewing images that are linked to candidates and meet quality thresholds. If a scanned image fails to meet the required standard, the test centre will be alerted and asked to provide a re-scan.
To enable uninterrupted scanning, answer papers are cached on the local PC and queued for background upload, making the system tolerant of poor internet connectivity.
The dashboard highlights sessions and components with outstanding items via a percentage-complete indicator with drill-down functionality to easily find details of missing scans.
A traffic light warning system instantly highlights incomplete scans and other warnings/errors to users. Batches containing errors are unable to be uploaded until all missing scans or ordering issues are resolved.
A reconciliation process will automatically highlight mismatched items as duplicate warnings when the correct items are processed. Scans are not released for marking until the session is complete for a centre, ensuring all mismatched items have been dealt with prior to marking.
A batch reference is generated to confirm the answer sheets have been transmitted successfully. This reference acts as proof of delivery and can provide a way of identifying a batch should any pages within it need re-scanning.
The system supports the capture of attendance and misconduct information from test centres including absentees, early exits, special requirements candidates, and unscannable candidate responses (damaged papers).
The invigilator report allows for unscannable reasons such as absence, malpractice, damaged papers etc. to be logged against individual candidates and components. A user can record all unscannable candidate data on the web portal or scan/upload the report with the answer papers.
The system includes a wealth of features to support quality assurance. These include performing image compression, checking for mismatches or mis-verified candidate responses and reviewing image quality prior to upload for verification.
Additionally, administration teams can perform the following tasks:
- Monitor centre progress (e.g., number of forms to scan, scans pending review, completed scans, and scans escalated to a centre)
- Chase outstanding actions
- Download reports covering rescans, user access, system audit, user performance, and user accounts
Some of the benefits include:
Once exam paper scanning is complete, the system will identify answer papers based on the template type. These answer papers are intuitive for candidates and include essential features to guarantee high-quality images that are correctly aligned and accurately matched to enrolments. These features include:
After identifying a paper, document recognition technology extracts candidate responses. Optical mark recognition (OMR) scores multiple-choice questions (MCQ), intelligent character recognition (ICR) reads short written responses and optical character recognition (OCR) captures machine-printed text.
Simple rules such as alpha, numeric, dictionaries, date ranges, database lookups and mandatory fields will be checked at this stage with exceptions queued for human review.
OMR technology can, for example, read candidate responses to MCQs and export a value for each question (i.e. A, B, C, D). Alternatively, OMR can mark each question (if pre-loaded with the answer-key) and export a final score (rather than raw responses).
Following a OJEU tender process, the British Council commissioned Civica as the prime contractor to deliver an on-screen marking (OSM) solution to mark up to 5 million ‘pen and paper’ IELTS tests each year.
As part of the agreement, Civica appointed ePC as its sub-contractor for the script capture, processing and verification work.
Expert in language assessment automates paper-based assessments with OMR exam processing and on-screen marking system.
Leading UK university uses TeleForm to design, scan and verify OMR answer sheets from undergraduate and postgraduate examinations.
Reading School release exam results faster by outsourcing 11-plus exam marking to ePC.
Colyton Grammar School (CGS) mark 11 plus entrance exam in two days with ePC’s scanning bureau services and automated marking system.
ePC capture the 11-plus entrance test for Chelmsford County High School for Girls.
ePC process the 11-plus entrance test for Heckmondwike Grammar School.
ePC capture and mark the 11-plus entrance test for The Blue Coat School.
