Digital Assessment Initiative: Reality Check-In by

"Mongolia is a developing nation...most of our students don't use computers, they use their phones"

alexandralee2_2 — 2024-04-09 20:33:54 UTC

Small Private DP School in Mongolia

1-50 students

BYOD Policy

"Let's do this!"

alexandralee2_2 — 2024-04-09 20:39:19 UTC

Small Public CP School in USA

51-100 students

1:1 school-provided Windows laptops for all students

227 schools have experience administering digital assessments and feel very prepared.

“As May exams take place in 'rainy season', it does happen that we lose internet if there is a particularly violent storm. We are located in the tropics. We have also had issues with racoons eating through cables!”

alexandralee2_2 — 2024-04-09 20:45:31 UTC

"Currently, in Ecuador, we are with daily electricity cuts of 3 hours."

162 Schools have frequent outages

"Usually students are only using their tablets. And in your definition tablets are no computers. So nearly nobody is using a computer in school."

alexandralee2_2 — 2024-04-09 20:48:37 UTC

Concerns with leading with the November Sessions

2024-04-09 22:45:45 UTC

Schools in the November session have a preconceived notion about the examination being graded harder in November than May due to the smaller cohort size. The ask was to consider leading with the May session.

44% of schools that responded to the survey use Chromebooks

2024-04-09 22:51:39 UTC

Compared to 79% using Windows laptops and 73% using MacBooks. Chromebooks are most frequently used in IBA, specifically Public US schools. These are typically school-provided Chromebooks but schools have indicated that students have their own Chromebooks as well.

Compatible with a wide range of devices, including BYOD, is highly requested by schools, with some concerns

tnguyencysac — 2024-04-09 23:06:01 UTC

"Training [and upskilling] invigilators [and teachers] to inspect [BYO] devices and look [out for potential security risks] will be important."

Exam venue, spacing, charging, and cheating concerns

tnguyencysac — 2024-04-09 23:09:13 UTC

Most challenging as the cohort size increases, the need for space and charging/power supply for students increases. Limited capacity of existing computer rooms. Physical cheating concerns with students being able to view each other's screens.

Practice environment

tnguyencysac — 2024-04-09 23:11:55 UTC

"Access to a wide range of practice assessments and student exemplars with examiner comments." "access to past papers without needing to access them on the IBApp; give teachers autonomy to mix and match questions from past papers..."

Consider advantages and disadvantages of DA - accessibility, equity and access

tnguyencysac — 2024-04-09 23:17:59 UTC

Subjects lending itself better on paper

tnguyencysac — 2024-04-09 23:26:32 UTC

Science, maths, character based/script languages

Opportunities - reducing handwriting issues, accommodations and accessibility tools in a digital platform

tnguyencysac — 2024-04-09 23:27:29 UTC

"...allowing students to change font size and other qualities of exams to create a more bespoke access experience."

Support for low cost operating systems like Ubuntu

2024-04-16 13:57:47 UTC

Would we allow support for low cost hardware that could operate on Ubuntu rather than just Window / iOS / Chrome. I'm thinking expansion to some third world regions.

Schools will need support through changes in admin processes

2024-04-16 13:58:28 UTC

As part of transition to Digital Assessment we will be putting more onus on coordinators to manage their rescheduling processes & A&I requests and as such will be creating additional responsibilities for those managing candidature.

Would be good to break the cohorts 1,2 and 3 into the school personas - this will help in comms, support etc which is relevant and proportionate for them

alexandralee2_2 — 2024-04-16 14:21:06 UTC

Link the change risks to personas

Might want to think through the cultural and political barriers/enablers as well

1EdTech QTI Specifications

alexandralee2_2 — 2024-04-24 20:22:06 UTC

Concerns about L&T

tnguyencysac — 2024-04-26 21:19:43 UTC

"It's not simply a matter of delivering final exams via computers, but rather the importance and support for proper integration of hese approaches in the teachings and assessment leading up to final exams. Does IB plan of offering a host of new resources that are complete? What about subjects that already have scarce representation with regards to support? Some of the language B courses hav eno commerical support, and past papers and audio amples are few and far between."

tnguyencysac — 2024-06-05 21:36:31 UTC

It's inevitable, really. The whole world is going this direction. I'm actually glad that IB has waited to let other parties "work the kinks out" so that our rollout can be smoother than theirs was.

tnguyencysac — 2024-06-05 21:39:19 UTC

We believe this places an undue burden on schools and has no advantages as an assessment model. This forces schools to use technology in the classroom as an assessment tool to a greater degree. This is not just about the exam cycle in May or November. Students should take the summative exams in their usual way of working so even if we had the infrastructure to do this in May or November it does not mean we have the infrastructure or the interest in doing this on a daily basis. We do not believe that taking exams in a digital format improves learning or learning outcomes and that data suggests students are not at an advantage for having spent more time in their developing years on screens.