1. Standardisation Briefing
REMOTE MARKERS JUNE 2019
Standardisation Briefing
Monitored via 10% Check

2. RM Assessor All marking will be carried out on RM Assessor. URL

3. Key Contacts Type of Query Whom to Inform Contact Number/Email Address
Assessment Queries
Team Leader
Details will be provided to you by your Team Leader
Script Allocations
Assessor Management
Please indicate unit and examiner creditor number as well as nature of query.
Withdrawing from Marking
Team Leader and Assessor Management
Please indicate unit and examiner creditor number. Also inform us whether your withdrawal is for this session only or permanently.
Technical issues with RM Assessor
RM Helpdesk
Administrative Queries Related to your marking
Customer Support Centre
Assessor Support Line
Resources you may need to access as an Assistant Examiner
OCR Assessment Specialist Portal
Instructions and Forms
Assessor Communications website

4. Regulatory requirements
Examining is regulated by condition H1.1 of the General Conditions of Recognition. This requires that the awarding organisation must:
have in place effective arrangements to ensure that, as far as possible, the criteria against which Learners’ performance will be differentiated are –
(a) understood by Assessors and accurately applied, and
(b) applied consistently by Assessors, regardless of the
identity of the Assessor, Learner or Centre.

5. Purpose of Standardisation
The standardisation process is designed ensure that all examiners have a well-founded and common understanding of the requirements of the mark scheme (appropriate to their responsibilities) and can apply them reliably.
Completing this process enables all examiners to mark candidates' work consistently and accurately.
It establishes a common standard of marking that should be used to maintain the quality of marking during the marking period.

6. Responsibilities
The Principal Examiner is responsible for the professional judgements underpinning the process of standardisation.
Team Leaders are responsible for supporting examiners through the standardisation process.

7. Standardisation for Remote Markers(1)
Question Paper can be accessed from the RM Portal day after paper sat date.
SSU (standardisation set-up meeting) take places 7-10 days after paper sat date (this is attended by Team Leaders and the Principal Examiner).
Mark scheme is finalised at SSU and practice and standardisation scripts are selected for the learning and testing phases for remote markers.
RM Portal

8. Standardisation for Remote Markers(2)
After the SSU your Team Leader will make contact with you to inform you that the mark scheme will be available via RM Assessor(this should be within 24 hrs of the end of the SSU).
Once you have accessed the mark scheme you should login to RM Assessor and access the practice scripts to begin the learning phase, followed by the testing phase.
This process is likely to commence approximately days after paper sat date (timescales can be shorter for later examination papers).

9. Standardisation for Remote Markers(3)
Exam is Sat
Marker accesses the Question Paper
SSU Meeting
(Approx 7-10 days Paper Sat Date )
After SSU - TL contacts team
Marker can now access mark scheme from RM Assessor
Marker can now begin the process

10. Standardisation Approval Process (1)
Download practice scripts, then mark and submit one at a time. Once you have submitted the first script, view the definitive mark by accessing the script in your closed items before continuing with the next practice script.
your Team Leader once you have finished the practice scripts. Your Team Leader will then contact you and provide feedback. This is your opportunity to ask any questions about how the definitive marks were awarded.
After this discussion has taken place, download the standardisation scripts. This is your test of marking. Mark these scripts independently and submit all at once.
Your Team Leader will then review your scripts and either:
- approve you to complete live marking or
- not approve you and provide feedback. You will then be asked to complete a second test (STM scripts) which you will need to download, complete and submit to your Team Leader.

11. Standardisation Approval Process (2)
After second test (if applicable) TL either approves marker for live marking or informs the marker and the examiner and assessors team that the examiner will not be progressing to live marking.
Guide
Location
Completing Standardisation Process
On Screen Marking, RM Assessor Examiner Instructions, Examiner Quick Prompt Guide
Marker guide
Documents can be located at

12. Standardisation Approval Process (3)
IMPORTANT NOTE
You must not download any live scripts until you have been approved to mark by your Team Leader.

13. Standardisation Approval Process (3)
Familiarisation and Learning
Practice Scripts
Testing
Standardisation Scripts
Non Approval
Approval
Second Test
STM Scripts
Non Approval
Examiner does not progress to Live Marking
Live Marking
TL informs Examiner and Assessor Management

14. Suspension during live marking (1)
If a Team Leader has concerns regarding your marking (as a result of your marking on seeded scripts) they will check some live scripts.
If following the live marking check your Team Leader still has concerns they will suspend you on the system and contact you to inform you that you are suspended from any further marking until the PE has reviewed the marking.
The PE will then review the judgements made by your Team Leader (as soon as possible) and then inform OCR and your Team Leader of the outcome.
This could result in the following:
Your Team Leader makes contact with you to inform you that you can continue marking or
An OCR Quality Support Manager contacting you to inform you that you will not be able to mark any further scripts.

15. Suspension during live marking (2)
TL carries out check
Completes live script checking form
Check reveals concerns
TL Suspends Marker
Sends completed form to Quality Support Manager and PE
PE considers Evidence (24hrs)
Examiner must be stopped
Confirms Decision to Quality Support Manager/TL
Examiner should continue marking
Quality Support Manager contacts Examiner to inform them of decision
TL informs marker and removes suspension

16. Marker Monitoring Live script check
Monitoring will take place through a live script check.
At least 10% of each examiner’s marking allocation will be checked (or a minimum of 3 scripts which ever is the greater).
The check will be recorded on a Live Script Check Form and submitted to your allocated Quality Support Manager as part of the quality assurance process for this unit.

17. Mark Return Dates and Grace Period
Marks return dates are available on the Assessor Communications website and will also be available to you within RM Assessor once you start marking
Grace Period
The marking grace period starts at 48 hours.
It reduces to 12 hours after the 50% marks return date.
Reduces to 0 hours after the 100% marks return date.
Assessor Comms Website (under the heading forms):

18. Confidentiality of Marking
Marking must never be carried out in a public place.
There must be no discussion of work in progress with anyone other than members of the marking panel and OCR. Therefore, do not discuss marking with anyone else including other colleagues or your family.
You should never discuss any aspect of marking or
marking process with the media.
Whether or traditional marking on paper, or marking on scoris, it is still the case that marking must conducted in a private, confidential environment and not a public place.

19. Suspected Malpractice (1)
Malpractice is when you suspect that a candidate or centre may have breached the regulations in some way, intentionally or not.

20. Suspected Malpractice (2)
If you suspect malpractice you must:
Mark any suspected malpractice work in the usual way, you must not attempt to account for any suspected malpractice in your marking.
You must report this by raising an Exception (you must not submit the mark at this stage). The Exception will be escalated to the Team Leader and then to the Malpractice Team who will resolve it.
Once you have received a resolution message you can submit the mark as normal. The malpractice process will continue outside of RM Assessor.

21. Conflict of Interest (1)
What to do if you download a response and you think you know the candidate
Although it is very unlikely, there is a remote possibility that you may recognise that a response you have downloaded for marking has been written by a candidate who is known to you. This is a conflict of interest, so if you recognise a response that you have downloaded, you must reject this immediately.
Where a response you have downloaded for marking has additional objects, you are advised to check these for any identifying details before you start marking it, so that you can reject it immediately if you recognise the candidate.

22. Conflict of Interest (2)
To reject a response:
1. From the Marking page for the response, click Reject Response.
A confirmation request is displayed.
2. Click Yes. The response is rejected and the next available response is displayed.

23. Conflict of Interest (3)
Please note: this method of rejecting scripts should only be used where an examiner recognises a candidate response. For instances such as illegible scripts or where responses come from an unfamiliar option route, the appropriate exception process should be raised.

24. Marking – Good Practice
It is important that you mark at a steady rate to ensure that you are not rushing to complete your marking to meet the deadlines set.
It is important to let your team leader know if you are planning to take any long breaks during the marking period e.g. not marking any scripts for a couple of days

25. Annotation Purpose and Importance of Annotation Mark scheme
Provides an audit trail of why marks have been awarded.
Improves visibility of marking process for centres.
Allows TLs/PEs to look at AE scripts and understand where/how marks were awarded. This means useful feedback to AEs can be given.
Mark scheme
Follow annotation principles as laid down in the mark scheme.
There must be evidence that every page has been seen by an assessor, including blank pages. Guidance will be provided in the mark scheme.

26. Giving Marks (1) Implications of incorrectly entered marks
Incorrectly entered marks (e.g. through mis-keying) result in candidates being issued with the wrong grade. This brings the integrity of the examination into question.
Ensure that you:
activate on screen mark confirmation so that when you enter a mark a large image of the number you have entered will appear briefly on screen.
are marking against the right image zone (for optional questions).

27. Giving Marks (2) IMPORTANT INFORMATION (PLEASE FOLLOW GUIDANCE BELOW)
Award No Response (NR) if:
There is nothing written in the answer space.
Award Zero ‘0’ if:
anything is written in the answer space and is not worthy of credit (this includes text and symbols).
Team Leaders will confirm the correct use of the NR button with their markers before live marking commences and should check this when reviewing scripts.

28. Rubric Errors PLEASE NOTE
Where candidates have a choice of questions and have provided more answers than required, then all responses are marked and the highest mark allowable within the rubric is given (by the system).
Enter a mark for each question answered into RM assessor, which will select the highest mark from those awarded.
This slide is only applicable to papers were there is optionality

29. Appraisal & Grading of Examiners
At the end of the marking period your Team Leader will be asked to grade you on the following:
Quality of Marking
Administration/Communication
This grading will determine whether or not you require any further training before you are invited to mark for future sessions.

30. Payment for Marking
Payment will only be made for scripts that have been marked and submitted.
Payment for marking will be made automatically at regular intervals during the marking period for scripts that you have marked and submitted.

31. Thank you for the marking that you will be undertaking for OCR for the
Finally………….
Thank you for the marking that you will be undertaking for OCR for the
June 2019 session.