Still Using Paper & Pencil

I am disheartened that another year has gone by in our organization and we still have to test all of our 2200+ staff with paper and pencil. We must test them yearly on a set of core curriculum and the only method I currently have to accomplish this task is to give them a paper booklet with all the learning material and a multiple choice test at the end of each module. An answer sheet that is completed by filling in the little bubble of the answer you think is most appropriate. Then when that staff member is finished their booklet and tests, they pass it on to the next staff member. 1 booklet for every 10 staff members.

I then get to scan all the answer sheets into a Xerox ProCentre which captures the sheet as a .tiff. I then use a program add-in for Excel called FormIdea 3.6 to "read" all the sheets and mark them.

Well this may all seem ridiculous, but it's a huge technological step for us. 2 years ago I was marking these all by hand. 6 months worth of marking and documenting and that was with 4 volunteers helping me. Needless to say the volunteers no longer come to me when I have work for them; I wouldn't either.

So what are some of the constraints I face doing all this?

• Well we can only have the 1:10 ratio of booklets because of how much they cost to print and once the testing is over there is no longer a need for the booklets.
• An organization of this size and not everyone has access to a computer or even an email account
• I'm a project of 1 as far as this testing is concerned
• Even when I do scan the answer sheets in, I can only do 30-40 at a time otherwise my computer crashes.
• My "fill-in-the-bubble" answer sheets last year had the letters "a,b,c,d" in as the choices, this made the reader incorrectly mark tests, so I had to update and fix the answer sheet this year

Overall, I think even with some of the concerns that fall around this project, I've worked around them last year and feel that I have improved them this year. I'm hoping the whole thing progresses much smoother and that the marking tests to reporting time will be decreased drastically.

I just can't imagine what the staff will think when I tell them next year we can do it all online. Christmas is coming early with a new LMS later this month. Just not quite in time for this testing period, but I can wait.