FAQ Digital examination
Frequently asked questions and answers for you as a teacher or examiner working with an exam with digital elements and exams with a computer on campus or another location. The questions cover the design, execution, submission and follow-up of the exam, as well as responsibility and administration.
Question compilation
Last reviewed February 28, 2025.
To get to the questions, scroll down the page or press on the question in one of the lists in this compilation.
Responsibility and setup
Last reviewed February 28, 2025.
What are my responsibilities as an examiner for digital forms of examination?
The examiner is responsible for ensuring that the examination is designed in a suitable way and can be taken under the current circumstances. Advices and recommendations regarding different types of examination can be found on the pages for Examination .
Do I have to use Canvas to distribute digital exams to students?
The First and Second Cycle Education Committee (GU) recommends to use Canvas for distributing exams or other forms of digital examination. You do not have to use Canvas, but KTH can only offer support for digital examination with Canvas.
Can I require my students to submit handwritten answers?
Yes, you as an examiner can set this as a requirement for the assignment to be assessed.
Note! Exceptions may need to be made for students with compensatory support from Funka.
Can I have an exam with only Pass/Fail on a course with grades A-F?
Yes, it is permissible to have parts of a course where students can account for different grade levels. For example, you can design an exam where students can only demonstrate knowledge for passing the course and not higher grades. Then you can have a separate examination for higher grades, which only interested students participate in.
It is important, however, that the examination is given in accordance with what is stated in the course plan.
Can I design an exam that is submitted by email? Such as a home exam
It is possible, but we recommend that you use Canvas Assignments for submissions. If you have a submission in Canvas, you can connect it to Ouriginal to be able to review the file regarding plagiarism and it will be easier for students to find your assessment.
Read more about Home examination .
Examination follow-up
Last reviewed February 28, 2025.
Can I make a randomized follow-up contact after the exam?
Yes, you as a teacher are allowed to contact students randomly during the assessment, a few students or all of them depending on what suits the course. It is important to inform students in advance about what applies to the examination. You are also recommended to book times in advance, so students know when they should be available for calls via phone or Zoom.
How do I know that students are available when I contact them for an oral follow-up?
You are recommended to book times in advance when students will be available for calls via Zoom. A good approach may be to provide several times that students can choose from, so that the examiner knows when the student in question is available.
How do I contact students via Zoom during assessment?
To reach a student via Zoom, search for the student's KTH ID in Zoom. If the student does not respond in Zoom, you should make at least two attempts to reach the student during the booked time. If the student does not answer then, or the student does not get back to you, the assignment can get a failing grade.
Where can I find the students' phone numbers if I want to do an oral follow-up over the phone?
Contact information for students is available in Ladok. Either you can retrieve the student information from Ladok yourself or ask the school office to provide a list of contact information.
Before the examination, you should encourage your students to update their phone numbers in Ladok.
What do I do as an examiner if the student can’t give me an account of their answers during the oral follow-up?
If the student can’t give an account of the answers they handed in, the matter will be handled according to KTH’s usual rules for attempts of misleading during an examination. Contact your GA or Director of Studies if you are unsure about how to go through with this.
Read more about Disciplinary matters .
Execution and submission
Last reviewed February 28, 2025.
How do I design oral exams, as everyone can't be examined at the same time?
If you are examining using oral exams, you can spread the oral exams out over several days. Early planning and clear communication with the students is important. A tip for easier handling may be to arrange group times, where the students present individually to the examiner and each other.
Read more about Oral examination .
An alternative is to carry out the oral exam as a video submission, in which case the submission can be done at the same time. Read more about Video submission for examination .
How do I randomize questions so that students get different versions of the same exam?
There are several different ways to accomplish this depending on how the exam is designed and how you plan to distribute the exam. We recommend that you use question banks both to randomize assignments and to randomize quiz questions, read more on the page New Quizzes item banks and randomized questions .
How should my students submit handwritten answers for a proctored exam on campus?
When an invigilator is present during the exam, submission of handwritten solutions should be done as for a regular handwritten exam. Students' answers are scanned and can be imported into Canvas for digital assessment.
Read more about KTH Import Exams – scanned exams to Canvas .
How should my students submit handwritten answers if they take the exam off campus?
As the examiner, you ask students to write on paper, take a photo of their solution, and upload it to Canvas. The student is responsible for ensuring that the solution is legible. It is strongly recommended that you offer a test opportunity before the exam where students can try taking a photo of handwritten text and uploading it to a test assignment in Canvas.
Communicate clearly with students about how you want the solution to be uploaded. For example, if you want all solutions in a PDF or if each image should be uploaded individually as JPGs or PDFs.
Practical instructions for students can be found on the page Handing in handwritten exams in Canvas .
A student has submitted parts of the exam on time, but other parts are missing. Can I accept late submission of parts of an assignment?
It is up to the examiner to decide what is allowed for the examination in the course. Remember that it is important to communicate a policy for late submissions with the students before the examination.
However, be aware that it is relatively easy for a technically savvy person to modify timestamps and other evidence of when documents or images were created. You cannot therefore trust that late submitted assignments were created during the examination period just because the timestamp says so, for example. If the examiner allows late submission, it is therefore recommended that the submission be combined with a new assignment or an oral exam.
Can I download submissions from Canvas, assess them and then upload the assessed submissions again?
Yes, that can be done even though it is recommended to grade using Canvas SpeedGrader. To do this you need to keep in mind that there is a size limit for uploading the files again, you can only upload 99Mb at a time.
Examination administration
Last reviewed February 28, 2025.
Is the storage space enough for all the exams being submitted in a Canvas room?
Yes. Assignments are stored in a different way than files and are not affected by the upper limit on storage space that is stated under "Files".
How should I translate terminology used in remote examinations into English or Swedish?
KTH has a dictionary that is continuously updated with both Swedish and English terms and words: Swedish-English dictionary .
What do I do if a student requests a reassessment of a grade on a digital examination?
Follow the relevant school's routine for reassessment of grades. Students always have the opportunity to request a reassessment of a grade, regardless of how the examination has been conducted.
If you are unsure about the routine, you can contact the school's office of Student Affairs or the administration at the institution. You can find links to the school’s offices of Student Affairs on the page Contacts to education support at KTH .
I use a question database that I intend to expand and improve before each course round. Can the exam be disclosed as an official document?
It is possible to invoke confidentiality for examinations that are part of a question bank. The digital exam becomes a public document as soon as the exam is taken, but can be covered by confidentiality if it is standardized. There is support for this in the Public Access to Information and Secrecy Act (Offentlighets- och sekretesslagen, OSL), ch. 17, § 4: ”Sekretess gäller för uppgift som ingår i eller utgör underlag för kunskapsprov eller psykologiskt prov under en myndighets överinseende, om det kan antas att syftet med provet motverkas om uppgiften röjs” (roughly) ”Secrecy applies to information that is part of or forms the basis for a knowledge test or psychological test under the supervision of an authority, if it can be assumed that the purpose of the test is counteracted if the information is disclosed”.
As long as the same exam documents are used, it is possible to invoke confidentiality for the information in these.
The following are not covered by the possibility of invoking confidentiality:
- Database questions that are unique to an examination opportunity. As in not standardized.
- Database questions that are not included in the examination, and thus not the basis for the student's grade.