Belgravium system gets top marks from Edexcel

The Hobbit is more than just the prequel to The Lord of The Rings - it's also a project that has revolutionised exam marking across the country.

Project Hobit, to give it Edexcel's spelling, stands for Hellaby Operations Booking-In and Tracking, and is an integral part of managing the scanning of exam scripts. It was introduced by Edexcel, the UK's leading awarding body, for UK public examinations in November 2003.

Students' written exam scripts are scanned in and broken down into single questions and answers and stored as digital images on the computer. Through secure, password protection, individual questions are accessed by trained examiners from their home computers or marking centres and marked onscreen using Edexcel's innovative ePen system.

The system has been tried and tested over many years by Pearson, Edexcel's parent company. Benefits include faster and more accurate marking and the elimination and inherent danger of scripts being posted to and from examiners around the country. Indeed, results are often available to schools over a week earlier than the published results' day.

From its early start in November 2003, the volume processed in this manner has steadily increased with each monitored pilot. By January 2005, over 5 million scripts will have been scanned and marked onscreen.

Edexcel uses an automated booking-in system which this summer took receipt of nearly three million scripts - 30 million sheets of paper) in parcels which identified the paper type and the schools that sent them. A 'traffic light' system extracted the appropriate number of scripts for marking, day by day.

"We receive more than 400,000 scripts in a single key day of exams," says Operations Manager David Hansell. "We employ a lot of temporary staff at this time - exams are very seasonal work. For the Summer 2005 examination period, we successfully processed up to 150,000 scripts (1.5 million sheets) a day. Under the new system, exam papers can be scanned and available for marking markers to start within days with all scripts fully loaded onto the system for ePen marking within 15 days of the exam.



Hansell continued: "This new system has greater integrity. It's a safer process. It's faster and less bureaucratic for data administration. Previously examiners had to mark a sample, post it back to us for checking. We would write and confirm to them by post that everything was in order and they would continue marking, and posting samples and completed scripts back to us. The new ePen marking process is better, because examiners focus on certain questions, not a whole script. Examiners set the speed for marking time expected for each question, and the results are more accurate marks completed is a faster time that with tradititional marking."

Martin O'Hara, Processing Manager, remarks: "Our Hellaby team is responsible for the digitising of students' work to provide electronic images of scripts for marking by trained examiners onscreen," he says. "We've invested in new hardware and software to move the business forward and plan to scan and mark a projected 12.5 million scripts in 2007.

Edexcel is driving the modernisation of assessment and onscreen marking in examinations."

The investment also includes a new warehouse management system to store students' scripts by subject/paper to allow speedier access and scanning. The system, known in the industry as pick-to-light, is provided by Belgravium Ltd. It allows scripts to be uploaded onto the computer at the speed that markers are completing the papers - so that there is total control for team leaders of each subject and paper. The system also interacts with the attendance register data that is sent to the centres in advance of the examinations being sat and so the system knows how many scripts are expected to be in each individual package as it is picked to be processed. If any are missing, there's an early alert. This cuts out a major amount of administration that used to be done by the examiners themselves, something they do not miss!

Mechanised conveyors transport the scripts throughout the process and around the system. Full reconciliation of packs and scripts received is inbuilt, as every pack and individual script has an unique barcode associated with it allowing tracking at every phase of the process.

"During the summer processing, the Hellaby site was running 24 hours a day over three shifts, each one will have just over 100 staff, covering booking-in, sorting, slitting, scanning and editing," says Martin.

"The investment means that Edexcel is the driving force in modernising the examination process, and the beneficiary is ultimately students who can get their results earlier than has ever been possible. The Belgravium system is integral to helping us meet our targets."