Remote Invigilation
Driven by global student needs
Pearson has a mission to support lifelong learning and help students make progress in their lives. To achieve this, learners need to have the opportunity to perform to the best of their ability in their exams and go beyond paper-based exams in a hall.
So, in addition to a choice of paper-based or onscreen assessment, Pearson are proud to have a remote exam invigilation service*. We made history in 2023 and 2024 by piloting and running remotely invigilated exams for International GCSE students in partnership with online schools. This innovation has won the eAA Award for Best Transformational Project in 2024. This year, 560 students sat over 5,000 exams with us across multiple timezones.
Student centered assessment
The exam experience is personal and complex to every single one of us – as a student, teacher, and parent. Many learners choosing to take exams remotely will have specific reasons to take exams remotely such as geographical challenges, SEND, anxiety, health issues and/or additional needs. In many cases, they would have been unable to otherwise complete exams and achieve qualifications.
Our aim is ensure each student can complete their formal examinations away from exam halls and test centres while retaining secure examination conditions.
In the video, hear Teagan’s story. Teagan was the first student to sit her International GCSE exams remotely – she tells us how Remote Invigilation helped her and what she did next.
Play
How remote invigilation works
Remote invigilators at Pearson monitor students using three different camera views from three different recording devices. These included views of the student’s screen or printed exam paper, their location, and also their webcam and microphone settings.
There’s a chat function between students and remote invigilators. Through this, learners could ask for assistance, for example when checking their set-up was okay or confirming times for rest breaks.
As well as every exam being watched live by a remote invigilator, the sessions were recorded and reviewed to ensure adherence to exam guidelines. Meanwhile, students completing onscreen exams were required to access the exam platform via an installed Safe Exam Browser or kiosk mode – meaning that everything other than the exam was locked down. This prevented the use of other programmes or the internet during the exam session.
Availability
*The remote invigilation service is currently only available to independent schools and virtual/online schools.
Subject availability: Paper-based
Mathematics
Further Mathematics
Biology
Chemistry
Physics
Science (Double Award)
Geography
French/German/Spanish*
Religious Studies
Global Citizenship
* excluding MFL spoken component
Subject availability: Onscreen
English Language A
English Literature
Economics
History
Business
Read more about remote invigilation
An introduction to the Pearson Remote Invigilation Service
In 2022 the MacLeod family from Alberta, Canada contacted Pearson’s CEO, Andy Bird after seeing him on a news programme talking about our qualifications being 'location agnostic' and that anyone could sit a Pearson exam, wherever they were in the world...
What could Remote Invigilation mean for education?
Ashley Harrold, CEO of Inspired Online Schools, explains how remote invigilation unlocked access to International GCSE exams with Pearson in 2023 and what it means to students now and in future.