Kingsdale Foundation School’s journey of conducting online entrance exams for children in a secure, stress-free virtual environment

Kingsdale Foundation School receives over 3000 applications every year and hundreds of students simultaneously appear for the entrance tests. However, COVID-19 created significant disruption in all admission-related activities for the school and applicants, leading to the suspension of processes.

There were serious concerns about the future of education, entwined with stakeholders’ safety. The school administration understood it had to prepare to commence the admission process based on academic schedules. Hence, it decided to pivot to conducting its examinations in the virtual setting.

In order to move the entire entrance test process online, the school needed a platform they could trust in every aspect. They had very specific requirements that the platform needed to fulfill.

Data security

Kingsdale Foundation School narrowed down its requirement to a viable online exam platform that would allow applicants to take the entrance test in an anxiety-free, safe environment. It had to guarantee the test’s quality for candidates and also, meet the highest security and compliance standards concerning data privacy.

Provision to replicate a standardized exam structure

Kingsdale’s entrance tests are divided into several sections. A few of these sections are timed. Also, there are questions that need more detailed processes to be solved. It was essential to have a solution that enabled them to replicate those sections on the virtual mode.

Child-friendly interface

The students appearing for the entrance exam were in the 10 to 10+ year old age bracket. Therefore, it was mandatory for the school to have an exam platform that was child-friendly, easy to use, and augmented with resourceful elements like video tutorials and practice sections.

In addition, evaluating young kids online required additional efforts to convince parents about the security of the platform, its uncomplicated use, and other features. For that to happen, the school had to choose a platform that could check all the right boxes.

Reducing manual intervention

It was equally critical to manage the faculty’s workflow by relieving them of mundane and burdensome examination-related duties, enabling them to focus on more pressing and rewarding matters. Hence, the school mandated a dynamic and secure end-to-end online examination platform that could enable it to create, administer, supervise, deliver and evaluate its annual entrance exam with ease.

Mercer | Mettl understood and appreciated Kingsdale’s requirements and the challenges in fulfilling them. Therefore, Mercer | Mettl advocated its most viable value proposition- the futuristic online proctoring and examination solution EXAMIN.

Mercer | Mettl’s EXAMIN caters to the entire cycle of examination, enabling faculty and administrators to create question papers, schedule exams, invigilate using a mix of AI and human-led proctoring, assign answer sheets to evaluators and reviewers, and finally declare the results. The digital solution does all this without compromising students’ exam-taking experience.

Let’s take a closer look at all the solutions Mercer | Mettl’s EXAMIN was able to provide:

EU- GDPR compliance

As a public body, it was crucial for Kingsdale Foundation School to be EU- GDPR compliant while conducting online exams. Mercer | Mettl’s focus on stringent cybersecurity protocols addressed the school’s concern regarding data breach, unauthorized access, and privacy at every stage of the examination process. Mercer | Mettl’s online exam platform was hosted on EU servers with full GDPR compliance. The platform’s validation also includes ISO 27001:2013 certification.

Therefore, Kingsdale was able to assure parents of optimum security at every level. Only a limited number of staff members had access to the necessary data like recordings, answer sheets, and reports.

AI proctoring

Mercer | Mettl enabled Kingsdale to switch to a fully AI-based proctoring during the entrance exams. On the one hand, the smart technology helped prevent cheating and on the other hand, it sped up the whole process, saving an enormous amount of time. The efficiency of the AI ensured that hundreds of students could take the exam simultaneously without excessive faculty intervention. In addition, it helped reduce human errors and prevented organization hassles for the school.

Robust IT infrastructure

Mercer | Mettl’s online exam platform can accommodate a vast range of customizations to match the specific requirements of the client. That is how Kingsdale was able to replicate their standard exam structure digitally.

Mobile-readiness

Mercer | Mettl’s EXAMIN is a mobile-friendly platform that works across multiple devices. Therefore, students who did not have access to laptops or desktops could also take the exam without hassles. This feature accentuated the platform’s ability to serve Kingsdale’s requirement of a child-friendly interface. The overall structure of the exam and the platform was curated in a way that the process would not be taxing for children in the specific age group.

Reporting metrics

The platform’s instantaneous report generation feature was incredibly efficient at saving significant staff hours that were otherwise spent undertaking paper evaluation. Aside from precise evaluation, the reporting tool gave the faculty access to intricate, relevant and accurate data, helping determine applicants’ full potential.

24x 7 support

Mercer | Mettl’s technical backend and customer support teams ensured 24*7 client and candidate support. The teams hand-held, trained, and actively assuaged every online examination-related concern while working round the clock to keep the software up-to-date, compatible, and error-free. They also mitigated candidates’ concerns throughout the assessment drive.

Mercer | Mettl’s top-of-the-line offerings addressed numerous bottlenecks in conducting online entrance exams with integrity and ease.

The way forward

Kingsdale Foundation School has chosen to continue using Mercer | Mettl’s online exam platform for annual and mid-year entrance exams. The uncertainty about the restoration of normalcy and the ease with which the faculty and students could undertake the tests, contributed to the decision to continue with the association.