Neil, We have a couple of professors that are spearheading a move towards using wireless for exams. We have added additional capacity to several classrooms to facilitate this endeavor. The professors have said this has been largely successful. In a class of ~250-300 students, the students are given "5 module competency exams" as well as the final exam using 'Carmen' (our implementation of Desire2Learn) as well as the Respondus lock-down browser plus password protection. They have found that 85-90% of students have a functional laptop on which to take the exam. For those without a laptop or if their laptop battery is drained, they have a "backup location" staffed with a teaching assistant and approximately 20 computers.
I agree with Chuck Enfield at PSU in that this usage of wireless is coming and we, as wlan professionals, should prepare ourselves for this. Students expect mobility, and as such, wireless networking. Wireless solutions (we use Aruba) are capable enough to provide sufficient performance and resiliency on wireless. Anything that has previously been done with wired networks are going to need to be supported on wireless. Technology in the classroom is becoming more and more prevalent, and we cannot simply ignore or refuse the need to support such uses of wireless LANs. If we are fearful that the wireless network cannot handle the load or cannot be relied upon, then perhaps we need to approach these as problems to solve and not problems to accept. Is our job more difficult? Yes. Is it more exciting? Yes. ========== Ryan Holland Network Engineer, Wireless Office of the Chief Information Officer The Ohio State University 614-292-9906 holland....@osu.edu On Aug 18, 2010, at 12:54 PM, Johnson, Neil M wrote: > We are getting inquiries concerning the use of the wireless network for > computer based exams in large lecture halls. > > Although we provide coverage in most of our lecture halls, our current policy > states that given the unlicensed nature of 802.11 spectrum we can’t guarantee > network availability and performance and therefore don’t recommend using the > wireless network for this type of testing. > > I was wondering how other institutions approach this. > > Thanks. > -Neil > > > -- > Neil Johnson > Network Engineer > Information Technology Services > The University of Iowa > Work: 319 384-0938 > Mobile: 319 540-2081 > Fax: 319 355-2618 > E-mail: neil-john...@uiowa.edu > > > Spam > Not spam > Forget previous vote > ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE > Constituent Group discussion list can be found at > http://www.educause.edu/groups/. > ********** Participation and subscription information for this EDUCAUSE Constituent Group discussion list can be found at http://www.educause.edu/groups/.
