As we are near the end of the fall semester and final exams approach, we expect high Proctorio usage at Miami and across the country. With this in mind, we wanted to provide a few best practices to ensure that Miami students have a smooth exam experience during these high-stress times. These guidelines are specific to Miami and are based on recommendations supplied by Proctorio and used with permission:
Encourage quick computer reboots and connectivity availability.
Students use their computers for just about everything. Encourage your students to speak to their roommates or family members to ensure they have a reliable internet connection during the exam. That could be as simple as finding a time frame of less Wi-Fi usage so students can take their exam more efficiently.
Best Practice: Ask your students to take a moment before attempting to start their exam to ensure all unnecessary programs or software are shut down and restart their computer.
Ensure the Proctorio Chrome Extension is up-to-date.
Proctorio Chrome Extension gets auto-updated regularly. If the Chrome browser has not been restarted recently, the Proctorio Extension may not have updated successfully.
Best Practice: Ask your student to remove Proctorio Chrome Extension (by right-clicking the little “shield” icon in the top right corner of their Chrome browser) and reinstall it from here before attempting the final exam.
Consider re-entry options
We recognize faculty may need a higher level of security for final exams. This year, many students are back at home, sometimes far from campus or other locations with high-speed internet access. We strongly recommend that instructors review the “Allow re-entry” options in Proctorio’s Exam Settings.
Best Practice: Proctorio expects a record-breaking number of users to be on their platform and interact with their support agents this fall. With this in mind, “Re-entry with Agent” may not be the fastest way for students to re-enter their exam if and when an unexpected internet disconnection occurs. Allowing Re-entry will alert you of multiple exam attempts within the Proctorio Gradebook and enable students to continue their exam more easily. Note that “Allow re-entry” is the default setting unless it has been changed.
Prepare for unique exam environments
Please remember that during the final exam period this fall, students live with family or friends or are at locations other than where they were last year or in the previous months. We encourage instructors to be empathetic and understand that these exam environments are not the norm when evaluating desk/room scans.
Best Practice: Consider utilizing the “Scan at Start” option or disabling the desk/room scan option entirely for your final exam. Audio and video recordings will aid you in visualizing students’ exam environments without the assistance of those scans.
Understand how to best utilize Proctorio Gradebook
After your students take the proctored final exam, the Proctorio gradebook will generate ratings of Suspicion Levels for each exam submission based on students’ behavior and the security settings you have chosen. However, it is important to note that the Suspicion Levels in Proctorio gradebook do not determine if academic dishonesty has occurred. The Suspicion Levels automatically generated by Proctorio Gradebook are only helpful as a reference for further investigation.
Best Practice: After getting a high Suspicion Level in the Proctorio Gradebook, look into the actual flags and recordings in the Proctorio gradebook timeline to interpret what those flags might mean or what behaviors might be taking place in the recordings before making academic dishonesty reporting decisions.
We hope you find these best practices helpful for your upcoming exams. Again, when experiencing any issues with exam proctoring, Proctorio offers 24/7/365 support via live chat, email support@proctorio.com, or phone at (480) 428-4089 or toll-free (866) 948-9248.
