Unexpectedly seeing a particular location can trigger a long-buried memory, instantly transporting you back to a moment from your past. News reports into the recent meningitis outbreak in the UK often came from a sports hall in Canterbury, pressed into service as a vaccination centre. And straightaway this writer was back at a desk in that very place, struggling to recall the details of 17th century French drama for a university finals exam.
Practically everyone who has ever taken a school-leaving general qualification would need something comparable to trigger a similar Proustian rush. Very few can say that merely walking into a room in their own house could have the same effect. We spoke to one such person to understand the differences in candidate experience between taking high-stakes exams remotely or in an exam hall full of your peers.
Setting up to take exams remotely
The candidate we spoke to took GCSE exams in 10 subjects outside the UK, using a remote option offered by the exam board. They chose the home-based option to avoid having to travel many hundreds of kilometres to the only exam centre in the country providing the exams. The candidate’s family set up a location in a room at home. Having done that, each exam involved a four-step process:
- Receiving each exam paper and answer book electronically
- Printing the exam paper and answer book using a home printer
- Answering the questions using the printed answer book in a pre-determined time slot
- Scanning the answer book and uploading it to the exam board
For any exam, security and detecting any malpractice is paramount. In this remote exam scenario, the following arrangements guarded against possible malpractice:
- The exam room was monitored using three separate cameras, one of which recorded proceedings as a backup in case the connection dropped out.
- An employee of the exam board acted as a remote proctor, viewing the feed from the cameras and who could be contacted by the candidate using an online chat facility.
- The candidate had to display all the materials they had access to, such as writing implements, to the remote proctor before starting the examination.
When asked to reflect on the positive and any negative aspects of the candidate experience for remote exams, the candidate categorised them as follows:
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Positive |
Negative |
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Remote option widens the choice of available qualifications even when candidate is located far from an exam centre. |
The responsibility to print exam papers and answer books, then scan the answers and upload them led to anxiety about possible technology failure. |
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Familiar location lowers stress levels and uncertainty associated with unfamiliar surroundings. |
The requirement to be present for the printing and scanning elements added time to the whole process. |
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Provided continuity with online school learning. |
The hardware and connectivity necessary for the security arrangements may not be available to everyone or could be prone to failure. |
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Convenient availability of support created confidence in the process. |
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Three-camera monitoring felt secure and engendered trust. |
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Many of the negative elements could be mitigated with a true digital delivery of the exam, conducted entirely on connected devices.
How the shared experience compares
For post-16 studies, our candidate returned to an in-school learning environment. Their A-level exams, taken in the summer of 2026, were conducted in the normal school exam-hall type setting. This gave them the extremely unusual perspective of having taken high-stakes exams in two very different ways. They described the positive and negative elements of this exam scenario:
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Positive |
Negative |
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Being with classmates, teachers and others pre- and post-exam makes for a collective experience and can provide reassurance. |
The number of people in one place, operating to different schedules, creates a greater possibility for outside distraction to intrude. |
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Exam management elements, such as ensuring the exam board receive the answer booklets are not the candidate’s responsibility. |
The need to conform to certain behaviour expectations, such as remaining seated throughout and maintaining silence, can be stressful for some. |
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Wide range of adjustments available to candidates who need them. |
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In total, our candidate felt that remote and digitally delivered high-stakes assessments still require development and improvement if they are to be a reliable guarantee of positive candidate experience. However, even in the form our candidate knows them, they do improve the experience for certain groups of candidates.
The pace of change towards increased digital assessment for general qualifications depends not only on awarding bodies but also regulators. The technology exists to at least pilot approaches that improve the candidate experience if that is one of their priorities.
