Inspera (http://www.inspera.com) is a company based in Oslo, Norway, that offers English-language online assessment tools, resources, and support. Colleges and universities, as well as K-12 and corporate education, are adopting online assessment in order to better respond to student demand and needs, provide more extensive and useful learning analytics, save money, provide faster results, cope with large scale exams and a variety of other reasons specific to their situations.
Inspera assessment tools are specifically designed to plan, deliver, monitor, and grade large-scale online exams, whether offered in a single or multiple locations. The systems can also be customized to fit other circumstances. Students bring their own devices as designated by the institution.
The Inspera e-assessment software is designed in a modular format, offering faculty members access to one or all of the following capacities.
Authoring – The software supports and guides faculty and instructors as they develop a wide variety of styles of test questions or import them from other sources and previously created tests. Videos can be integrated as part of questions; students can use free-hand sketches, arrows, and other devices to respond, as determined by the faculty member or instructor.
Planning – Inspera coordinates the planning and scheduling of exams, syncing with an organization’s LMS to list who is taking the exam, who is invigilating it, where students are taking the exam, and what online tools students are permitted to have access to during the exam, such as a spell check program.
Monitoring – During an exam, the system monitors that the student’s technology is working properly, security measures are all in place, and the students stay online and connected to the exam. All the student input is synchronized in real time to local files and saved so the faculty member/instructor/invigilator can collect all the results on a storage device or the results can be sent to the cloud. The faculty member/instructor and/or invigilator can create a dashboard in Inspera to monitor the students throughout the exam and spot any technical or other challenges.
Grading – Marking of exam papers includes a combination of machine and manual marking. Built-in plagiarism controls can review papers prior to markers and highlight concerns. Markers can provide details on marking to students, share points of interest among themselves, and record private comments which may be useful in case of appeals. Once all papers are graded, the system creates a complete report and is able automatically adjust marks if requested. Papers and/or marks can be sent to the students. Reporting tools can be customized to report on any aspect of exams or marking.
Support and Resources – Online support for Inspera tools includes weekly webinars for faculty/instructors and markers to learn about the tools, guides for exam preparation, exam day, and grading, and technical help for students.
Inspera is used by educational institutions, governments, and awarding bodies in Europe and North America.
Truls Bøhm, CEO
Truls Bøhm, the CEO of Inspera, highlights the company’s experience in creating online assessment software that has supported the National Exams at the secondary school level in Norway since 2008. Advised by this experience in delivering quality, high volume and scalable online assessment, Inspera developed a targeted product and began to work with higher education institutions in early 2014.
Through its modular design, Inspera software offers its clients a choice of using one, two or three of its key service components – planning, delivery and grading. For example, Cambridge International Examinations, a UK-based client, uses it own system for planning and authoring questions; Inspera software manages the delivery and grading.
Product Advancements – Inspera is currently developing tools so their software will better support testing in math and science. It will be easier and more intuitive for students to use, allowing for the inclusion of components like the steps in the calculations, not just the final response.
In parallel with educational advancements in adaptive learning, Inspera is working with adaptive testing, modifying for higher education a logarithm developed by Swisscom, the Swiss communications company. In adaptive testing, the test adapts according to the responses from each student.
The test begins with a series of mid-range questions. The more advanced students can move through these quickly and are provided with more challenging questions. Lower performing students who encounter difficulty with the mid range questions are offered less difficult questions to assess their level of capacity. Upon completion, the new Inspera system will allow for more accurate and quicker test-taking, as well as provide a better analysis of the level of comprehension and skill of each student.
Looking Ahead – Inspera is a strong presence in the Norwegian and Swedish markets for digital assessment, and is also extending into U.K. and Dutch higher education. The ease of use of the product and the recognition of Scandinavia as a leader in digital assessment are contributing factors to this expansion. Truls Bøhm is looking forward to having the company grow into one of the major players in Europe and beyond.
As a long-term consequence of digital delivery, Truls would like to see new methods of assessment evolve that take better advantage of the capacities offered by a digital environment. Students could research, critically assess, and present online information in a testing situation, rather than repeat information already learned. He characterizes the steps as “paper-based exams to paper-based exams reproduced online to new examination models that take advantage of the digital environment”.
For more information, contact:
Jens Andreas Pettersen
Creative Director
Inspera
