Use Safe Exam Browser to turn your student's computer into a temporarily secure workstation for assessments.
Safe Exam Browser (SEB) is a separate application that can be used to lock down a student's computer so that it can only access certain programs and websites. It can be a great tool for in-class digital exams and tests, as it allows you to tightly control which resources your students are able to access for a period of time. You and your students will all need to install SEB prior to running the first exam. The initial setup process for SEB is a bit technical, and so we recommend you ask your school's IT staff for help to get going.
Remote note: SEB cannot provide a completely secure exam environment for remote learning. Students can still access notes through old fashioned methods or by using multiple devices. Additionally, it can create a technical hurdle that is difficult to troubleshoot remotely when you want your student to be doing the exam! Instead, we recommend using screen recording to help monitor your students' activity during the exam.
Follow the tips below to set up a more secure environment for Stile quizzes and tests:
- Download and configure SEB;
- Hide Lessons and release the test;
- Run the exam session with SEB;
- Collect and hide the test.
Download and configure SEB
Download SEB here and have a read through the documentation for your operating system. There are quite a few settings that you can specify to suit your needs! This article will cover the basics.
Before you launch SEB, go to the Assessment Lesson you intend to run with your students on Stile and click into it. Highlight the entire web URL from your browser's address bar and copy it to your clipboard (Ctrl + C on Windows, Cmnd + C on Mac).
Launch the SEB app next and open its Preferences menu. A new window will appear, which has several tabs. General will be the first tab open by default. In the General settings, click on Paste from saved clipboard to paste the link to your Stile assessment. This will be the first page your students will see upon launching SEB and logging in to Stile.
In the same window, create an Admin password. This password will prevent your students from making changes to the exam configuration, so make sure it is clever enough that they can't guess it.
Create the Quit/unlock password next. This is the password you will give your students to exit out of SEB at the end of the exam.
Once the General settings are ready, click on Config File to move to the next tab. Make sure that Configuring clients is selected under the first setting. The Settings password is optional. This is a password you can give to your students to open the SEB file, and it can be helpful if you plan to distribute the SEB file to your students well ahead of the exam time.
To review:
- The Admin password prevents your students from editing any of the SEB settings.
- The Settings password allows your students to open the SEB file to start the exam.
- The Quit password allows your students to exit SEB and restore control over their computer.
Click the Save settings as... button to save your SEB configuration file. Give your SEB file a unique name to let your students know what it is for, such as MrMcD-Yr8CellsExam.seb. This is the file you will give to your students.
For more configuration options such as allowing access to other websites or applications during the exam, please refer to the documentation available on the SEB website.
Hide Lessons and release the test
SEB will limit your students to accessing Stile, but they will still be able to freely navigate between Lessons and Subjects within stileapp.com. Just before your students sit the exam, hide all related Lessons and then release the exam. This will ensure that they are unable to view those Lessons, despite being able to navigate to other Stile pages.
You can read about releasing and hiding Lessons here.
Run the exam session with SEB
Give the SEB configuration file to your students. This can be done via email or your learning management system. Your students will each need to open the file, which will disable external apps, secondary monitors, and lock them in to stileapp.com. After they log in they should be redirected to the exam link that you set as the starting URL.
When your students have completed the exam, give them the quit/unlock password (not the admin password). This will allow them to exit the SEB app and restore access to the rest of their computer.
Collect and hide the test
Make sure all students have submitted the exam by the end of the session. You can do this via the Markbook.
Collect any exams that have not yet been submitted to prevent students from working on them later. Finally, hide the test from the Class so they cannot share their work with any other Classes that still need to sit the exam.
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