Memorandum to Schools 93/2008

10 October 2008

2008 October/November Examination Centre Messages: Delivery Methods

The Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority (VCAA) will send examination centre messages after the commencement of each of the October and November written examinations.

The message is sent after the commencement of the examination so that students have time to read the examination paper thoroughly.  Should they have a concern about a possible error on the paper there is an opportunity for the VCAA to investigate this and then provide advice to all students should this be necessary.

The Examination Centre message should be given to the Chief Supervisor and ultimately filed in the VCE Examination Document Register.

Usually the examination centre message will be PROCEED NORMALLY. If an examination error has been identified, instructions will be provided for supervisors about the announcement to be made to students.  In these circumstances the subject of the message will be SPECIAL MESSAGE RE EXAMINATION.

 

1. MESSAGE DELIVERY

The VCAA will forward examination centre messages via:

• a fax delivery service
• email to the school’s VASS mailbox
• email to the school’s official mailbox.

 

2. COLLECTION OF EXAMINATION CENTRE MESSAGES

Fax Service

Delivery by this method will occur without intervention by school staff provided the correct fax number has been stored on the fax service, and the school’s fax machine is not engaged or off-line.

If the fax machine is busy, one additional attempt will be made to deliver the message.

The agreement with the service provider requires the transmission of the fax to schools within a 15 minute time frame. Please note, on occasion, some faxes have arrived later than the specified time. School staff should continue to observe the fax beyond these times if the message has not arrived.

A test fax delivery will be run on Monday 13 October at 10.30am. No follow-up action will be required of schools.

The time frame for fax delivery for the November examination period is as follows:

Thursday 16 October

• 2:30pm – 2:45pm

Friday 31 October

• 9:30am – 9:45am
• 3:30pm – 3:45pm

Monday 3 November - Thursday 20 November (Weekdays)

• 9:30am – 9:45am
• 12:15pm – 12:30pm
• 3:30pm – 3:45pm

Please note that examination messages will be sent on Monday 3 November (the day prior to the Melbourne Cup holiday) and schools are required to have a staff member available to accept fax and/or email messages.

Email

• Two Examination Centre Messages will also be emailed. These emailed messages will be sent to the school’s email address via
  • the VCAA Examinations Unit
  • VCAA VASS Support.
• Please ensure that the relevant mailbox is cleared so that these messages can be delivered.
• The email sent via the VCAA Examinations Unit will be sent to all schools.
• The email sent by VASS Support will only be sent to schools with an interest in a particular examination. This will be all home schools, assessing schools and examination centres for each study.
• The message will be sent to the school email address recorded in VASS (see SCHOOL ADMIN → MODIFY SCHOOL DETAILS). A copy will also be sent to the VCE Coordinator if an email address has been entered for that person in VASS.
• Please ensure that the log-on occurs at the times listed above as the VCAA may only send the message minutes before these nominated times.

 

3. CONTACT FOR ENQUIRIES:

Simon Phelan, Ph 9225 2360, phelan.simon.s@edumail.vic.gov.au

If these delivery methods fail please contact Robert Hunt, Examinations Unit, VCAA, on 9225 2351, for the current message.

Special Message

From 2009 onwards, schools are advised that exam centre messages will no longer be sent via fax. From 2009 onwards, examination centre messages will be delivered using only the email methods identified above. Schools are advised to utilise the email message service for this October/November examination period to develop procedures for using these email messages exclusively in 2009.