Saudi Gazette School administrators are relieved and relaxed, for what took them two weeks of strenuous hours to correct exam papers, now only takes a few seconds. All government schools in Jubail, funded by the Royal Commission of Jubail and Yanbu, are relying on computers to correct exam papers this semester. Correcting test papers electronically saves plenty of time and effort of teachers who corrected papers manually. The school administration said that 2,800 test papers were corrected in an hour. All multiple choice questions are corrected via computers. The teacher corrects only one essay question written by the student on a separate answer sheet. The marks are then entered into the computer and the final grade is instantly calculated. Supervisor Bandar Al-Ghamdi said, “Marking the test papers during the first week of exams was smooth sailing. The new computer system ensures that all the exams for each subject will be corrected on the same day of the exam. In the past week, the computer corrected 80,000 test papers.” The cooperation and hard work of the teachers prior to the exam helped make this electronic grading system a success. Teachers were required to conform to a certain style of questions, enter all questions and their answers in the system, and limit the essay questions to one essay per exam. Electronically correcting the test papers was proven to be accurate and efficient, with almost zero percent chance of an error. In addition, the grades are graphed appropriately and the highest, lowest, and mean average grade for each subject in each class is also calculated. Another member of the grading committee, Khalid Al-Yami said, “Every day an enormous number of test papers are corrected in record time. Grading the test papers electronically is much faster and more efficient than the traditional methods.” Students can now collect their report cards much sooner than the expected date. __
