Online exam blues for Unisa students
System failures and a malfunctioning invigilator App are some of the challenges faced by Unisa students who are sitting for their exams.
Students voiced their dissatisfaction with online examination as some have been told to apply for supplementary exams.
Speaking to Sowetan on condition of anonymity, the disgruntled students said they preferred sit-in exams as there are too many technical problems with online exams.
A second-year BCom financial accounting student said on Friday she was supposed to write a principles of management accounting exam but the system was offline.
“My exam was at 1pm but the system was offline. I think about two hours later we received an email with the link to use to submit the exam, which had to be in by 5.15pm. Unfortunately, I couldn’t submit my exam as my module did not appear on that link. I alerted the lecturers, who said there was nothing they could do and that I should apply for a special examination. I was so sad as it was not my fault,” she said.
Another student who was writing an internal auditing paper said the timing for their exams was not adjusted.
“The system is on and off and you end up not knowing what to do. I had spent a lot of time preparing for this exam, the last thing I wanted to worry about was a malfunctioning system. Even the invigilator App that they are using is sometimes down and we cannot access it on time,” she said.
Another student said when she submitted her module the system timed out and froze. “I have no idea if my paper was accepted. I will have to wait and see my results. I emailed the lecturer and there was no response,” she said.
The students also complained about delays in getting their certificates after completing their courses. Unisa student representatives council president Wandile Gimu said the institution was working on fixing the online technicalities.
“The ITC team is working hard to fix the system failure. However, I know that some exams that were disrupted by system failure were postponed to the following day. There was a problem with the certificates as the campus was closed and students had to fetch them at the Pretoria campus, which was a problem for those from outside the province. The university has started delivering the certificates to students,” he said.
Gimu said the invigilator App was one of the safety measures to guard against plagiarism but it was also experiencing system failure, something the university was looking into.
A media enquiry was sent to Unisa’s spokespersons Thomas Huma and Edgar Rathelele on Monday morning and it was acknowledged. Thomas said it was being attended to by Edgar and that they will respond. However, they had not replied by the time of going to print and they also did not reply to follow up text messages and email.
–-Sowetan
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