THE DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF COMPUTER-BASED TEST

APPLICATION FOR COLLEGES OF EDUCATION IN NIGERIA

A CASE STUDY FEDERAL COLLEGE OF EDUCATION, ZARIA.

*1 Muhammad Haruna Jumare, * 2 Rabiatu Lawal Umar,

*3 Abdullahi Alhassan Abubakar

1Department of Computer Science, Federal College of Education, Zaria, Kaduna, Nigeria.

*Corresponding Author Phone: +2348039538680 Email: muhammadjumare@gmail.com
2Department of Computer Science, Federal College of Education, Zaria, Kaduna, Nigeria.
*Corresponding Author Phone: +2348036943896 Email: rabiatuumarlawal@gmail.com
3Department of Computer Science, Federal College of Education, Zaria, Kaduna, Nigeria.
*Corresponding Author Phone: +2348183087496 Email: abu2383@yahoo.ca

ABSTRACT
Examination being one of the very important aspects of every learning institution, it required
very good and standard processes of creating, conducting, accessing and evaluating it. Nigeria
being a developing country, have a wide usage of the manual (paper based) system of
examination. This also applies to FCE Zaria. Thus, this paper is aimed at changing the entire
FCE Zaria examination system to computer based with the development of a software. And this
was achieved by collecting data using background reading, questionnaire and interviews to
gather requirement for the new system. As a result of the everyday problem the manual system is
generating. The system will be able to accommodate the creation of exam by the lecturer, taking
of examination at the right prescribed time by the eligible student and finally generation of the
student’s result by the system to the lecturer who create the exam and the student who sat for the
exam. This is done immediately after the submission of examination by the student on the system.
Upon completion of this project, full completion of a multiple-choice examination system was
successfully developed and deploy. The system however still has a key future recommendation
such as essay part of the system and course registration which will be implemented in the future
version of the system.

Keywords— Computer Based Test, Examination, CBT, Education, Software, FCE

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INTRODUCTION
Information technology is no doubt one of the greatest support and important tool we

have in the development of the world today. With Information Technology, many things that

were hitherto thought to be impossible are now possible. (Andy, 2012) Many hard and brain

tossing problem situations are now easy with just a few clicks on a computer. This paper focuses

on making the examination and assessment in FCE Zaria to be online (computer based). It aims

at improving the processes of conducting or administering examinations right from the exam

course creation and exam question preparation to the generation of students result by the system.

Examination activity is one of the most important endeavours of every college in the world. It

determines a student’s progress and success in the institution. Hence much concentration and

careful attention is needed to prepare and sit for it. In FCE Zaria, examination tends to be a

daunting process for many students. At the start of the semester, they start to complain about

issues pertaining about their previous semester exams result before starting their registration for

the semester. Complains such as student not believing in exam score, courses result not available

etc. Most of these problems are not caused by the lecturers or students but are rather caused by

the system FCE Zaria uses. This proposed system generates a result to the student immediately

when the student finish attempting all questions and clicks on submit for the examination, they

are sitting for the student will see their exam score and the invigilator there will simply forward

the student result to the admin system where it will be stored.

AIM & OBJECTIVES

The aim of the research is to create a CBT Application for FCE Zaria.

This research will hope to achieve the following objectives:

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  To make the exam processes in FCE Zaria to be computer based, easier and more reliable

 To reduce the cost for the examination and resources such as papers usage and printers.

 To develop a CBT system with enhanced security features to avoid exam malpractice.

 To design a CBT system with real time processing of results for candidates.

 To make FCE Zaria exam process standard higher than many colleges in Nigeria.

LITERATURE REVIEW

“Examination is no doubt one of the key parameters for gauging students’ performance

learning institutions. Many researches have been done on how to develop the manual paper-

based examination to a computer based or online examination in other for the examination

process to be more reliable and efficient. A survey pertaining student’s result problems shows

that students are always in doubt most of the time when they meet their result irrespective of

whether they passed or failed. They always want to be very sure about how the marking is done

(marking scheme). They always want to review their exam answer script to go through it again.

With Information technology, reliability, efficiency, security, and effectiveness are some of the

key issues developers are still improving before the complete elimination of the manual paper-

based system is done. Here below are some articles on online examination and some of the key

factors that is to be taking into consideration.”

RELATED WORKS
““Nigeria as a growing and developing nation can only strive to meet up with other

globalized economies in the year 2026 if her educational system is developed to embrace ICT

and e-Learning as a tool to meet global standards and responds appropriately to the needs of the

society to fast-track her economic development”. (Hagi, 2013, P2). Online education and

examination are aimed to develop learning institutions and lower the unnecessary expenses at the

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institutions. Though in Nigeria most schools don’t have the access and knowledge of most of the

resources needed for e-learning and examination. This tends information technology personals to

developed solutions such as creating awareness and possibilities to the student right from their

early educational level. Exposing students on how to research on the net. Improving student

typing skills etc. On issues like this, suggestions were made to the government active

participating in providing ICT to the educational sector to providing needed resources and

facilities to learning institutions.

Web-based Exam Management Systems (EMS) is an efficient solution for disperse

learning. In their paper Rashad et al., (2010) developed an e-examination system. The system

was able to marks and grade the examination. The system design includes key functionalities

which include presenting of exam questions, time function for every exam, marking of exams

questions, and generating exam reports. The system was able to accept different type of

questions. It was a web base system which is a good idea for both local and remote exams. The

system allows exams that was already taking to be edited by a lecturer, an instructor or any

person that wish to set an exam on the system. The system was build using different tools such as

PHP for code design, MySQL for the system database, AJAX, and HTML for user interface

design.”

(Zahirul, et al, 2013), develop a system on online examination system that will be

suitable for both academic and non-academic purposes. They analysed three related systems and

try to figure out their flaws, main functionalities, and things so that they can improve on when

designing their system. The main functionalities they consider when designing their system

include the registration steps, exam rules, time limitation for examination, due time reminder,

restrictions after submission and result processing. Different software was used in the

development the online examination system. Software include Macromedia Dream Weaver,
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Extensible Hypertext Markup Language (XHTML), Photoshop, Micromedia Fireworks, PHP,

MySQL, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), Apache Server, and Symfony 1.4 framework. However,

security challenge remains one of the key challenges for the system even after it was developed.

(Adebayo and Abdulhamid, 2014) Developed a system on Online Examination as a

project. The system was developed with the aim of reducing bulky work and improving things

which include reduction of manual paper work, delay in result processing, various generation of

report when and where it is required, and sending feedback to the exam participants about their

exams result. Correction and other information will send through Small Mail Transfer Protocol

(SMTP). The system was designed for educational learning places mostly schools and colleges.

It generates result almost as soon as the exams is finished and submitted. The system can only be

used for multiple objectives questions.

METHODOLOGY
For successful development of the web application, the right software development

methodology has to be use. For the development of this software, a number of software

development methodologies such as water fall, plan driven, object reuse, Extreme programming,

incremental delivery and agile where carefully analyse in success rate of developing the

system. The use of both agile and object reuse methodologies was adopted in the development

phase of this system.

Analysis of Existing System

The current system that FCE Zaria uses for the examination activities is the manual

paper-based system. Paper based such that Departments’ exam office will type and print the

exam questions. Student are provided with the question papers and answer booklet to write the

answers in. This type of system however gives many problems to both the lecturers and the

students. Major technical function analyses on the existing system include how the college

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prepare the examination how the examination is taking and how the students get their result

while other technical functionalities examine are the problems student and the lecturer are having

with the existing system, “who have certain role and access to the system and what the access

is”, where IT can help in improving the system and steps on how the new system will simplify

the existing system.

Data Gathering Technique

Getting the right and useful information on a system is very important in the development

of any software systems. For data gathering on online examination system different data

gathering technique have to be used for one to get a valid information about the system to be

developed. Interview with relevant stakeholders, Questionnaire were distributed to staff and

student of the college, observation was done how the manual examination process is taking place

and finally some relevant documents were reviewed.

Functional Requirement
Functional requirements are requirements the system must have to meet its business

needs. Table 1 shows all the functional requirements of the application.

 Table 1 showing the functional requirements of the application

Req. No. Description
R-101 System will support all web browsers.
R-102 The application shall include a user interface.
R-103 The system shall authenticate users
R-104 System shall have a room for objectives only examination.
R-105 System shall redirect users to their respective roles when logged in
R-106 System shall have a room for objectives and theory examination.
R-107 Students shall be able to use the system for free exam testing.
R-108 System will be very fast in generating response to the user.
R-109 System shall have an easy navigation.
R-110 System shall generate a random question for each student.
R-111 System shall store all exams and their answer in its database.
R-112 System shall send student result via Email and SMS

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The above table displays the functional requirement needs of the system

The functional requirement are series of functionalities in which the system must perform in

other to be successfully.

 Non-functional Requirement
Non-functional requirements are requirements in which a system should have in other to

improve the user experience, it is not a necessity for the system to have. Performance Capacity,

Maintainability, Reliability, and security are some of the non-functional requirements

implemented.

System Architecture
  The system architecture of an application is a model that provides a graphical description

of the application; it describes the workflow as well as the behaviors of a system. It also shows

the structure of the systems and the relationship between components within and external of the

system. Figure 1 illustrates the application architecture of the entire CBT Application of FCE

Zaria.

Figure 1 shows the system architecture.

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System Use case
  A Use Case diagram shows the interaction between the users and the system. It shows the

functions of the system from the user’s point of view and the various actions and tasks the user

as the actor conducts. Figure 2 illustrates some use cases in the application and user interaction

with the use cases.

Figure 2 shows the interaction of CBT application with its user

The uses case shows a virtual representation the interaction between the user and the system.

Sequence diagram
The sequence diagram shows series of task and processes interacting with the system,

other sub processes and applications. Figure 3 depict the sequence diagram of different users

using the CBT application

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Figure 3 showing the series of tasks and actions of users of the CBT application
User Interface screen shot
The user interface design shows a virtual representation of the applications user interface.

Figures 4, 5, 6 and 7 show the user interface of the application.

The login interface for authentication of Student. The administrator must register a student

before he can login.

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A student selects his or her choice of segment to take the exam.

A figure of sample first segment courses, an exam must be active before a student can take the

exam.

A figure that shows Introduction to teaching profession exam has been selected.

Activity diagram
An activity diagram is a model that shows the sequence of a task or actions from a use case. The

activity diagram of student can be seen in figure 8 below.

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  Figure 8 showing the series of tasks and actions of student using the CBT application

IMPLEMENTATION AND TESTING

“The system was develop using Visual Studio 2017 and C# programming language

critically following the system architecture. However, Erwin database modular was used to

design the ERD and was forward engineered to MS SQL server which deployed a running

database of the system i.e., processing, adding, deleting and retrieval of data. ASP.net, HTML,

CSS and JavaScript were utilized during implementation.”

“The first implementation stage was a storyboard sketch of the design interface of the

system, follow by the database ERD sketch. UML diagrams like Use case, sequence and activity

diagrams were utilized for the system to have more vision on how the system will work and

whether the system design sketched will be possible. The admin module was designed to give

administrative rights to the system, the admin module can manage all the activities of the system.

The lecturer module was done next to give the lecturers their level of access in the system like

uploading exam questions and finally, the student module which was done last to give the

student their functionality like taking exam and viewing their score.”

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 “Testing is the process of debugging the application, fixing bugs and other logical and

operational errors, examining for faults in the system and fixing them. Unit testing is done for

individual classes to specific methods to test the given set of functionalities. Integration testing

this is done for all the classes combined to see if all components function properly together as a

whole, system testing is for the overall system to test all the requirements both functional and

non-functional testing. The testing was done by developing various test cases to verify each

feature of the application.”

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMEDATIONS

“The paper has discussed the design, implementation and testing of CBT application for

FCE Zaria, pointing the features and requirements needed to affirm the application as a success.

Most of the area researched were towards the development of educational applications in the web

and it can be incorporated in the development of e-applications to enhance learning processes

where also widely researched. For this project, a multiple-choice online exam system was

successfully achieved. Major functionalities such as time duration for each exam, exam

restrictions, preparing the examination by the lecturer, taking of the exam by the student and

generating result of the exam to the student and the lecturer by the system was successfully

implemented in the system. Strict role-based access was successfully implemented in the system

and at the same time it would be the lecturers work to assign the student names and admission

numbers of the student eligible to take the exams. Lots of experience and knowledge were gotten

during the implementation and deployment stage. Many challenges were overcome, some of the

challenges were ignore which led to the reduction in the system requirement while some lead to a

different approach on how the system was design, thou careful measure were taking as not to

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divert the primary functionalities of the system. This system can be utilized in any College of

Education in Nigeria.”

Recommendations

“We recommended that constant research of new ways to improve and enhance the

delivery of digital educational process especially with the use of emerging technologies like

Machine learning, virtual reality should be done more regularly, since technology is constantly

evolving, and opening new ways to improve old process and enhance them for a better future and

also online examination applications are very sensible applications which means that developers

have to take every functionality of the system very serious and important. Developing an online

examination system, developer must take consideration of many things first being who is

building the system for, and the range and application the developer is expected to make the

system to cover.”

Future Enhancements

  In near future, the system interface could be improved, with more attractive, interactive,

and meaningful multimedia, more functionalities like voice recognition, artificial intelligence

would be looked upon and implemented in the future and expanding the application to mobile

given the fact that it was designed just for the web.

REFERENCES

Adebayo O. and Abdulhamid S. (2014), “E- Exams System for Nigerian Universities with
Emphasis on Security and Result Integrity”, International Journal of the Computer,
the Internet and Management (IJCIM) Volume 18, Number 2.

Andy Walton, 2012, Influences of Information Communication Technology. Retrieved from

http://eunis.dk/papers/p81.pdf
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 Anil Kumar, 2014, Online Examination System. Retrieved from
http://www.slideshare.net/AnilKumar939/online-examination-system-project?
related=22

Arth InfoSoft, 2013, Online Exam Software eduexam. Retrieved from

http://www.slideshare.net/eduexam/online-examination-software-eduexam?related=19

Aurobindo Nayak, 2010, E-Examination System. Retrieved from

http://www.slideshare.net/conviction/eexamination?related=17

Hagi Sahib, 2013, Online Education system. Retrieved from

http://www.slideshare.net/HagiSahib/online-education-system-project-report?
related=25

Karmick S, 2012, Exam Curve. Retrieved from

http://www.slideshare.net/KarmickSolutions/examcurve?related=21

Magdi Z. Rashad, Mahmoud S. Kandil , Ahmed E. Hassan, and Mahmoud A. Zaher (2010),
“An Arabic Web-Based Exam Management System,” International Journal of
Electrical & Computer Sciences, Vol. 10, No. 01, pp. 48-55.

Md. Zahirul Islam, Md. Mostafizur Rahman and Md. Kabirul Jagannath. (2013). University
2,3Daffodil International University, Dhaka, Bangladesh. ONLINE EXAMINATION
SYSTEM IN BANGLADESH CONTEXT. International Journal of Science,
Environment and Technology, Vol. 2, No 3, 2013, 351 – 359. 351-351.

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