Alternative Testing

Some students have Alternative Testing accommodations, which include extra time (usually 1.5x) on exams and quizzes and a reduced distraction environment at the Disability Resource Center. If a student has this accommodation and wishes to use it in your course, you will see the Alternative Testing accommodations listed on their accommodation letter for your course. Here is what instructors need to know about their role in facilitating this accommodation.

• Students who wish to utilize their testing accommodations at the DRC testing center are required to log into their student portal and schedule at least 3 business days in advance of the test or quiz during the regular semester. This will produce an automated email notification to the instructor.
• Students are instructed to schedule their exam at the DRC at or close to the usual class time, so they will typically not report to the classroom on that day.
• Upon notice that the student would like to take their exam at DRC, instructors should upload a blank copy of the exam or quiz to their DRC Instructor portal.
• Instructors should also fill out instructions for the exam/quiz while in their instructor portal. This provides the DRC testing center essential information about the time limit of the assessment, materials that are allowed, such as notes, calculator, etc. If DRC does not have this information by the time of the exam, the student will not be allowed to have any materials.
• Upon completion of the exam by the student, the completed exam will be uploaded to the DRC Instructor portal for download. Instructors also have the opportunity to indicate on the instructions whether they want to pick up the physical copy at the DRC.
• Students have the option to take online exams at the DRC testing center as well. Timed online exams will need to have the additional time added by instructors ahead of time. Instructions for how to do this can be found here. If there is a password for the Canvas exam, please include that in your exam instructions.
• If a course has an online exam that has not been set to open at the beginning of the scheduled testing session, has not had the time correctly extended, or the necessary password has not been provided to access the exam, DRC will authorize the student to reschedule the exam for another time to allow us time to connect with the instructor to get them their approved accommodations.
• Per our testing policies, students who are more than 10 minutes late for their scheduled exam time or who miss their exam for any personal reason will need instructor permission to take the exam late or reschedule for another time.
• If a Canvas quiz needs to be set up to open at a time different than the rest of the class, instructions for that can be found here: Assigning a Quiz to an Individual Student.

Finals Week

At UNC, the finals week schedule differs from the regular semester schedule. To adapt to this, the DRC testing center implements the following approach to finals week to most effectively serve everyone.

• The DRC holds two testing blocks each day of finals week: 9 a.m. - 12:45 p.m. and 1 p.m. - 4:45 p.m. Students must start at the beginning of one of these sessions. This is to ensure students can access their extended time.
• Students must log into their student portal and schedule their final exams at least 5 business days in advance of each final exam.
• DRC asks that instructors please have exam copies and instructions uploaded or provided to us by the Friday before finals week, regardless of what day the exam is on. This allows our testing center to be organized for the week ahead and convert exams to alternative formats (e.g. audio versions) if needed.
• Students who are taking online final exams at the DRC testing center will need to start the exam at the beginning of their testing session at either 9 a.m. or 1 p.m. This may require instructors to create a separate Quiz in Canvas for DRC students with test accommodations. Instructions on this can be found here: Assigning a Quiz to an Individual Student
• As always, the time limit for online exams will need to be extended by the instructor in advance of the start time of the assessment.