Computer-based tests have a bright future in India

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Aamir asks the professor whether he knows their roll numbers and names and when the teacher says no, Aamir mixes their sheets with the rest.

A brilliant way to tackle an unsuspecting professor and not-so-sophisticated paper and pen based exam. However, the ploy wouldn't have worked in the new computer based system. For one the system would have automatically frozen at the end of the time limit and Aamir wouldn't have been able to smooth talk his way out.

Indian institutes of higher studies are finally embracing the global system of computer-based tests. The IIMs have already tested the waters. Though there were glitches, the bottom line is that every candidate who faced a problem was given a chance to re-write the exam on Jan 30 and 31. Not only will the IIMs benefit but about 100 management institutes, who use the CAT results to shortlist candidates.

Considering that over half a million students sit for management exams annually it's not surprising that entrance exam are going the online way. Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies, NMIMS, is reporting a smooth conduct of their exam in 12 countries synchronously with nearly 25,000 candidates having completed their entrance exam, NMAT, in the first 7 days.

The agency administering this test, Pearson VUE, part of the Financial Times group, claims executing this exam using a contingency planning framework fully aware that conduct of an exam of this magnitude could face technical and infrastructure challenges, especially in India. Moreover, they have taken a lead in offering the test-takers the flexibility of late registration and re-scheduling it later.

Of course exceptional students like Aamir can always face any exam and not get flustered by computers, but for others, like his friends, institutes have orientation programmes that students could walk through online and even take a demo test. For those taking NMAT it was available on the Institute's website.

The Computer Based Exam takes advantage of a more efficient system which saves time for the students, provides them with the flexibility of choosing and or rescheduling test dates, ensures security, helps differently-abled students, and opposed to popular belief, nullifies chances of leaked question papers.

The user interface is also designed to minimize reliance on computer skills. Candidates do not need to have prior computer experience to use CBT. There is a reduction in response errors as questions are presented one at a time. Moreover, mistakes in transferring answers from an exam booklet to an answer sheet are decreased.

Even with these advantages, it retains the edge of the pen and paper exam - ability to move within sections or questions. During the time allowed for the test, candidates may return to previous questions, change their answers and mark questions that they would like to review before completing the test. However, once the candidate completes the test or the test time is over, the candidate can no longer access any test question.

The administration of the test is unbiased as is the scoring, because it negates human error while evaluating answer sheets. Time-keeping for each candidate is rigidly controlled so that everyone has exactly the same amount of time to complete his test.

For the institutes it is more efficient considering the number of students that sit for management exams every year. The sheer logistical nightmare of distributing question papers to widely scattered exam centres and then collecting and transporting the answer papers back to the evaluation centres is avoided. There is no need to appoint a large staff to painstakingly go through the answer sheets and tally the marks. This also enables easy scalability across geographies, as with NMAT this year, which went going global.

The statements of the chairman of the NMAT Admissions Committee that in the first 7 days, there has been no test batch cancellation because of technological or infrastructure reasons, and only 4 out of the 1,020 batches experienced a temporary stoppage after which the tests were resumed successfully, are re-assuring that the computer based testing has a bright future in India. Perhaps with a lot of contingency planning and a bit of luck!

(The author is a Bahrain-based commentator and writer. She can be contacted at mehtanina@gmail.com)