Exams Overview

Astra Schedule supports the creation of exam records for academic sections via exam meeting time mapping.  Exam section meetings are generated per term for applicable courses as configured.  Exam meeting times are assigned based on the meeting time of the section meeting as defined.  Once generated, exam meetings appear along with other section meetings and details on the section form and can be scheduled into rooms either manually or through optimization.  

The overall exam scheduling process has three general phases: 

1. Exam Setup
2. Exam Creation
3. Exam Scheduling

1. Exam Setup

The exam setup phase includes the system exam configuration and definition required to support exam creation and scheduling.  This includes information that must be configured to perform exam scheduling, but only needs to occur one time.  Once configured, this phase does not need to be revisited unless changes are required.

1. Define Exam Types(i.e. Final, Mid-Term, Written, etc).
2. Associate Exam Types to courses per course Meeting Type (dictates which courses have exams).
3. Define exam room scheduling preferences.

2. Exam Creation

The exam creation phase is comprised of the steps necessary to generate the section exam meetings for a specific exam session and term.  Exam creation must be performed every time new exams are required.

1. Create an exam session for a specific term (i.e. Final Exams for Fall 2009).
2. Initiate the creation of exam meetings for the term. The system will identify course sections for the term that are configured to have exams, generate exam meetings, and apply room preferences.
3. Initiate meeting pattern mapping. The system will present a list of distinct meeting patterns for sections with exam meetings in the term.
4. Enter exam meeting times and dates that correspond to the section meeting times.
5. Initiate application of exam meeting times to exam meetings. The system will update the exam meetings and apply the times as configured.

3. Exam Scheduling

The exam scheduling phase occurs after the exam meetings are created and assigns rooms to the exam meetings.  This phase is similar to scheduling sections for an academic term and may be performed manually or by using the optimizer.

1. Initiate exam-specific room assignment optimization. The system will assign rooms that meet room preferences and exam needs.
2. Manually resolve any remaining room scheduling or exam meeting issues.

View Exam Meetings

Exams are section meetings like all other section meetings.  Exam meetings can be viewed and manipulated within Astra Schedule to resolve scheduling issues, make manual overrides to exam times, create cross-listed common exams, add additional exams, remove exams, etc.

Exam meetings may be viewed when viewing the meetings of a section, or by filtering the section list page so that only exam meetings are displayed.

When viewing the section list page in the "Sections" view (parent-child), any section with multiple meetings can be expanded to view its meetings.

Similarly, when a specific section record is opened to view its details, its meetings are displayed on the Meetings tab within the section record.  Exam meetings are displayed in this detail view as well, attached to the meetings for which they were created.

To view ONLY exam meetings (or sections with exam meetings, depending on view) on the section list page, set the "Is Exam" filter to Yes and refresh the list.

Add Additional Exam Meetings

Exam meetings can be manually added to sections to accommodate the addition of ad hoc and break-out exams.  Because exam meetings must be linked to a specific section meeting, the exam creation process begins slightly differently from adding a new section meeting.

To manually create an exam meeting for a section:

1. Open a section to which you would like to add an exam meeting.
2. Click the Add Exam Meeting button next to the section meeting that will be linked to the exam.
   
   
3. Select the applicable exam session and click the OK. A new meeting tab will display in the section for the exam meeting.
   
   

   

4. Enter the exam time and date information, default preference rule, and other pertinent exam meeting details.
5. Click Save at the top of the form to save your new exam meeting.

Scheduling Exam Meetings

Manual scheduling of exam meetings can take place in the same way as other section meetings.  The ad hoc room scheduling tool is provided when editing the exam meeting and will help to identify available rooms and resolve potential conflicts.