Proctoring for online classes - in-person and distance

[Lisa Young]

Hello,

At our institution, many faculty require an in-person proctored exam for students enrolled in online classes. With increased enrollments in online classes, our space and human resources in our testing center are being taxed. 

I am curious as to what other institutions are doing to accommodate the need for proctored tests for online classes?

Any thoughts and experiences would be greatly appreciated.

Best,

Lisa

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Lisa C. Young, Ph.D.
Instructional Design/Educational Technology Faculty
Scottsdale Community College

[Ruvi W]

We have been looking into a bunch of options at ASU.  We currently have an extended pilot with Respondus Monitor - and the link below has a video that will give you a great 2 minute intro.  Faculty who used it really like it.  It is comparatively cheap (licensing is based on seats. Seat= 1 student in 1 class, unlimited exams), works well, and seems to act well as a deterrent to cheating.  Example: One faculty member teaches the same class in-person and online.  She gives closed-book exams. In years gone by they only used Respondus Lockdown browser and the online students always scored higher (because RLDB on it own is useless, because who doesn't have access to a second device for cheating purposes?)  With Respondus Monitor, the scored onground and online we the same.
Faculty report no technical problems from students.  They also said that it didn't add any significant time to grading exams.  They skim over the thumbnails, and view suspicious looking activity.  One faculty said that she soon recognized what was "normal" movement, from suspicious movements.

http://help.asu.edu/sims/selfhelp/SelfhelpKbView.seam?parature_id=8373-8193-7926
https://www.respondus.com/products/monitor/pricing.shtml

Problems we have run into so far (minor)

1. Student bandwidth was insufficient and the video dropped (RM can drop as low as 3 frames per second.  Of the thousands using it, only 3 have run into problems.  Moving to a different internet connection has resolved the issue

2. The student who took the exam, and then emailed his female prof and apologized saying he forgot he was naked when he took the exam.  Uh... yeah. 

3. One student posted a rant on Reddit that gained some traffic, but nothing serious.  It soon sank into conspiracy theories, jabs against big brother, disappointment at the lack of trust, etc.

http://www.reddit.com/r/ASU/comments/20qlyz/webcam_required_for_exams/

The argument we put forth is that proctoring levels the playing field, so the honest students are not placed at a disadvantage, because the dishonest students are cheating.

We also have used ProctorU with some of our online classes.  This is when a live person monitors your exam.  It works, but is expensive because you pay per exam (based on length of exam).  ProctorU has people facilitating and monitoring the students.  The actual monitor can (per their software) monitor up to 16 students, but they claim that at this time the highest they have gone is 12 per student (during Final's week) but most of the time it is far fewer.  Students have to schedule exams and pay a premium if they have to schedule at short notice.

http://www.proctoru.com/

Cheers

R

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[Melanie Kroening]

Hi Lisa!

We have a testing coordinator specifically for the online/distance ed program at Oregon State and he oversees a small staff.  (http://ecampus.oregonstate.edu/services/proctoring/)

• Locally we have 2 rooms on campus reserved for proctored testing and can proctor up to 30 students at a time in each room with the staff, the on campus proctoring is free for students. 
• We utilize ProctorU for an online option, I think it is $25 per student if they schedule ahead of time.
• There is also a list of additional proctoring options for students local to them, some cheaper than ProctorU and some a lot more expensive.

I think from a recent meeting we had about 1500 tests proctored locally and 1500 tests through ProctorU and had very few issues with ProctorU so it seems to be a reliable option.  We have about 13,580 unduplicated students annually, 39,337 enrollments annually (i.e. as some students take more than one class)

When a new online course is developed and scheduled in SIS, a note is placed on the schedule specifying that it is a class that has proctoring and additional fees may apply.  This way students can choose at the point of registration whether or not they are willing to pay proctoring fees which they must do on their own.  Faculty are notified each term to submit a proctoring request so that the testing coordinator has the details of which exams are going to be proctored and when and the passwords needed, etc.  The coordinator also has access to the proctored classes to help with troubleshooting when there is an issue. 

I tend to dislike proctoring in online classes and prefer those that use final projects/application activities but it can be important in some online courses to have proctored exams so I think making the option available is probably important in an online program.  Hope this helps!  Let me know if you need more information.  I'm slowly learning how things work here...

Melanie Kroening

Instructional Designer

Ecampus, Oregon State University

On Thu, Apr 10, 2014 at 7:34 AM, Lisa Young <lcby...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[Ed Bachmann]

I didn't see anyone reporting www.smarterproctoring.com. It inserts via LTI in LMSs like Canvas and lets faculty connect the proctoring communication and scheduling tool with a Quiz in their course. Lots of control for faculty on testing requirements. Students search a database for acceptable proctors. Some, like local public libraries, could be free for the student and others could charge. That transaction, if needed, is facilitated by the tool and the proctor site agrees to pay part of their fee to SP. Once a proctor is selected, the instructor can oversee testing progress. Cool part for us, there is no cost to the college. We are still piloting, but I see no down side, even if it is just another option. It is essentially replacing a paper and pencil process managed by our office as an alternative to going to the campus testing centers.

Andrew at SmarterServices will gladly give you a test drive.

Cheers!

[Lisa Young]

Thanks so much for the info everybody!