My TECEP Experience (A Rant)

Hopefully the following message will serve as a warning to those who may have to take a TECEP exam, and a way to vent my frustrations.

On Nov 13th I sent in payment and registration information to TESC to take the Intro to Opermations Management TECEP exam. I was in a hurry, so I sent information overnight mail, arriving to them on Nov 14th. On the form, you are asked to request a test date. I requested Nov 25th. While this may have been a stretch, had they of sent out my exam with 48 hours of receiving registration, it would have arrived before the 25th. On Nov the 20th, I received the charge from TESC on my credit card. This was 4 business days to process my request. I was not satisfied with this, knowing my test would not arrive by the 25th, but thinking it should arrive before the end of December.

As the final days of November approach, I began calling my local college asking if the exam had arrived. It hadn't. December had come now; a total of 7 mail days since my credit card was charge, and still no test. I decided it was time to call TESC and make some inquiries. So, I called the testing office, found the extension that seemed most appropriate, and no one answered, just a voicemail. So, I continued calling. Five total times, througout the day, I rang that number, and never an answer. I decided that maybe I should try some other extensions in the testing office (there is no testing office receptionist, from what I know). What a surprise! No one else answered their phones either.

The next morning, I decided I'd leave a voicemail message, and hope for a reply. That did not happen. So I continued to call for two more days, several times a day, and no one answered at any extension in the testing office I tried. I then decided to try the testing office e-mail and see if I had better luck. Thankfully, in about a day, I got a reply. It said "Your test date is Dec. 15th. Your proctor will receive the test no later than Dec. 10th." First, I thought to myself 'Dec 15th is my test date?' This was not the date I requested, nor even close to that date. It seemed at though it was just arbitrarily assigned to me, without ever bothering to inform me of the fact. I then realized that my card had been charge for weeks, and my test had not even left their office, nor had a received any contact from them. This was not good business.

Well, Dec. the 10th came, and my college had not received the exam. I e-mailed back and informed them of this. On the 11th, I was informed my test was not even sent until the 9th of December via UPS. I was told to contact him again if it did not arrive by the 12th. This statement irritated me, because it showed complete incompetence by this individual. There was no way the exam was getting across the country in 3 days. A quick reference of the UPS website shows that Trenton, NJ to California is a 5 day shipment. This means the exam should arrive on the 16th, late for this "testing date" that they pulled out of the air to assign me.

The 12th came, I decided to make sure the test hadn't arrive, just so I could official say it didn't. I was now irritated, I wanted to talk to a live person, and I wanted to talk to one now. Calling the testing office, once again, lead to an unending choice of people's voicemails. I decided to call the main line in hopes they could connect me to someone. My conversation went something like this:

Me: "Yes, Hello, I've been trying to reach your testing office, but no one answers the phone. I need to know when my TECEP test was sent, and when I can expect it to arrive"

Receptionist: "One moment, I'll find someone for you to speak with" ..................... "Sir, I'm not getting an answer either, let me try another number, okay?"................."I can't reach anyone. If they are short staffed, possibly everyone is out for lunch. If you call again after 2pm, everyone's lunch hour is over, and I'm sure we can find someone to help you"

So, I waited until after 2, and made another call:

Me: "Hello, I need to speak with someone in your testing office. They do not seem to answer when I call. I have a question about a TECEP exam, and need to know when it was sent"

Receptionist: "One moment sir"....."Hmm...I'm getting a voicemail, let me try someone else"......."Well, I'm not having any more luck than you. Let me try one more time" .................

Anonymous Voice: (could be the same receptionist, or someone else, not sure) "Hello, I'm gonna need to transfer you to Mr. Samuels, he sends the tests"......

*Mr. Samuels voice mail picks up, and I slam down the phone in digust*

I'm hoping once I finally get my test and take it that I can convince someone to expediate the grading process, due to my prior poor service. However, I assume this happening is very unlikely.

So, I guess a warning to anyone who needs to have a TECEP exam proctored, plan in advance, several months in advance if need be. As it stands, this delay is probably going to push my degree conferral date back another month and a half.

Thank you for letting me vent. ^_^

P.S. The previous message is assumed to have several typos and spelling mistakes. I'm sure you get the general idea, though.

 

Randy,

Wow, what a bummer. I'm planning to take that exam (this coming April) so I'll keep these delays in mind and register very early to be sure.

Please let us all know how it all works out...

Mark

 

Rosie's experience with TECEP was vaguely similar:

* a few weeks to send the exam out
* arbitrarily assigned test date instead of the one she requested
* a few weeks to mark the exam
* results initially sent only to her, although she had indicated on the form that it was for "Excelsior College", so she had to fax a transcript request.

Rosie had no trouble reaching TESC staff by phone, though.

Excelsior College Exams are processed much faster, and are cheaper, and are given a letter grade. So if you have a choice (e.g., if the subject is "Abnormal Psychology"), I'd recommend those.

 

Unfortunately the ECE Production/Operations Exam is no longer offered as of 9/30/03, so the TECEP exam is one of only a few options.

 

What's *really* interesting to me about this random assignment of test dates is that TESC charges $20 to reschedule an exam. I thought that charge was pretty nervy when I read about it. It's way beyond nervy if they're charging the tester to change a date s/he didn't even request.

 

TECEP Exam

I am truly sympathetic with Randy_Excelsior but have to say that my experience with TESC was just the opposite. I mailed my request and check in early (at least 6 weeks in advance, if I remeber correctly), I had no problem using a local reference librarian as a proctor, my test arrived before the scheduled exam date and I received my grade in a timely manner. Also I was able to get a transcript out to Excelsior in a timely fashion.

Overall I'd say the test was fair (even a bit easy IMHO for an upper level DB exam, COS-311 DB Mgmt) though it appeared to have been cobbled together from the different recommended textbooks as I thought detected differences in the style/wording of the questions.

 

Are TECEP exams not given a letter grade?

Cy

 

June writes:

> What's *really* interesting to me about this random
> assignment of test dates is that TESC charges $20 to
> reschedule an exam. [...] It's way beyond nervy if they're
> charging the tester to change a date s/he didn't even request.

They don't require that the exam be taken exactly on the scheduled test date, just "within two weeks of" it. I suppose most students whose requests arrive too late to process for the requested date want to take the exam ASAP, and contacting the students to set new dates would just delay them further, hence the "random" dates.

Cyrus writes:

> Are TECEP exams not given a letter grade?

"After testing, the student will be sent a score report. It will list a numerical score as well as a CR (Credit) or NC (No Credit) result. Note that passing results only appear on a Thomas Edison State College transcript. [...] This means that a Thomas Edison State College transcript will NOT show a score, a letter grade, or a failed test, only tests completed successfully and the number of credits awarded."
http://www.tesc.edu/students/tecep/regadmin.php

When Excelsior gets a TECEP result, it records the "CR" as "P" for "Pass".