How to run a secure online exam with the Lernie Lockdown app

Online exams can be every bit as fair as paper ones. The trick is to combine good question design with the right settings. Here's the setup we recommend for midterms and finals.

Start with a question bank

Instead of writing a fixed paper, build a question bank for the topic. Add more questions than you need, and tag them by difficulty. Banks can be shared across all your courses, so the effort pays off every term.

Editing a quiz in Lernie, with options to add questions from a bank or generate them with AI

Draw questions at random

In the quiz, choose Add random questions and tell Lernie how many to draw from each bank. Every student gets a different set of questions, and with Shuffle questions and Shuffle answers turned on, even shared questions appear in a different order.

Set the rules

• Time limit: long enough for a well-prepared student, short enough to discourage looking things up.
• Availability window: when the exam opens and closes.
• One question at a time and Lock questions after answering: students move forward only, the way they would in an exam hall.
• Hide scores until released: marks stay private until you've reviewed everything.

Require the Lernie Lockdown app

For high-stakes exams, turn on Require Lernie Lockdown app. Students start the exam from Lernie and it opens in the lockdown app, which keeps them inside the exam until they submit.

During every attempt Lernie records integrity signals: time spent per question, navigation, answer changes, tab switches and pasted text. After the exam, the Behaviour view gives each attempt a risk level so you know which ones to look at first.

Integrity signals are there to help you decide, not to decide for you. A high score is a reason to look closer, not proof of misconduct.

After the exam

Review any flagged attempts, grade the essay questions, then release scores from the quiz or the gradebook. Students get a notification as soon as their results are available.