IIT-Bhubaneswar, which was among first institutes to conduct online examinations successfully in the country in the wake of COVID-19 , concluded the process by declaring end-semester examinations.
“It is gratifying that the institute could fully organise the lectures and laboratory sessions without any loss, the students have fully earned their degrees as per the IIT standards by appearing in conventional examinations using online mode,” said R.V. Rajakumar, Director of IIT-Bhubaneswar
Of the 448 students who took the online examinations, 385 cleared their end-semester examinations. Encouraged by 100% participation in online examinations, the IIT-Bhubaneswar has scheduled comprehensive online examinations for junior students from July 22.
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“The commercially available systems for online examinations are normally designed to hold computer-based tests and not for conventional examinations. They have certain limitations. IIT Bhubaneswar had created an innovative system in-house to hold conventional examinations online,” said Prof Rajakumar.
The Computer and IT Services Cell (CITSC) of the institute had brought about a lot of improvisation on a commercial system provided by Wheebox for the in-house system.
“One of the challenges faced in the system design was to provide fairness of access to students who have a lot of variation in available gadgets and internet connectivity. Since the answering can also be done with pen and paper, the requirement of internet is reduced to question paper access, answer paper uploading and invigilation,” said Prof Rajakumar.
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He said the institute provided multiple options to facilitate the students to take the test with fairness.