I just left the REC after taking my last module. I was fairly confident going in, and pretty confident that I had it when I dropped the test off. Module was Q186, 10 question Navigation Problems - Oceans. I was told I got 50%, which was very surprising. I asked to look at the test, and I immediately noticed that at least 3 of the questions were marked wrong incorrrectly. The ‘distracters’ were marked as the correct answer on a Latitude by Mer Passage problem, Amplitude problem, and Time of LAN problem. I asked them to check if they had the correct answer key. They reviewed the test, then noted that I had 9 out of 10 questions wrong. They had ‘missed’ the other 4 I got wrong. I filed 3 comments with proofs on the most obvious questions.
Has anyone had this happen before? This was at REC St. Louis. I’m not really sure what my options are here. I just went through Lapware and found the 3 most obvious questions to make sure I wasn’t going crazy, and lapware has my answer marked as the correct answer so I know I’m right. I’m going back to test again in the morning but I’m worried they will have an incorrect answer key again.
I just found and reviewed the other 6 questions and I had all those correct as well. I’m not entirely sure what to do.
This made me chuckle. Maybe you should have just kept asking them to check again until they said congratulations, you got a 90% this time.
Outside of the comments that you submitted, I don’t think there is much else you can do. You can also file a challenge before leaving the test, but that seems to only apply if the mariner has failed the module by a single question.
I’d say that your situation may have just been a fluke. Try again and see how it goes. If you get the same issue, ask if there is another coworker who can possible review the answers.
I just got a call from them. There was apparently a ‘glitch’ in the answer sheet program. I’m not sure how a glitch marked all the distracters correct but there you go. I still have to test again however. So it’s good to be vindicated? I guess? But still not a pass until it’s a pass.
I think knowing my stuff good enough to know that the answer key is wrong and why should count as a pass but it’s the USCG.
I really don’t think this is fair, I should just get a passing grade and be done, but I don’t know any way to move forward and just testing again will probably take less time than trying to protest it up the chain.
Are you sure they told you that you must re-test? If so, is the reason just the “glitch” or did they re-score with the correct answer key and your score was less than passing?
Just re-tested and passed. Saw one incorrect answer that appeared to be keyed with the celestial horizon answer marked correct instead of the visible horizon answer on an amplitude but I was in a hurry to get out of there and didn’t comment on it.
Jdcavo, is there like a key with distracters marked for use with challenges or something? I don’t know how this happened but all the distractors marked as correct doesn’t seem like just using the wrong answer key.
It’s highly unlikely to have been a one-time “glitch.” If it was a software issue, it probably would have manifested itself long before now, both generally, and with that specific module. Module versions are not generated for specific users, there is an inventory of them (rotated often) and each module version (and its answer key) is used for more than one applicant. It’s also extremely unlike;ly you were the only person to have been given that specific version. It is very possible the wrong answer key was used to score your exam.
If I’m understanding what he means by distractors (tempting wrong answers put there to catch the unwary) it would be one hell of a coincidence for a different key to match every single one.
often incorrectly derided as “trick” answers. An ideal distractor is the answer you might get if you made a common error. For example, if you apply compass error in the wrong direction, your (wrong) solution will probably be one of the choices.
Right. So what are the odds of ten out of ten of them being called out as correct?
I can only be sure of 4 of them. One was an amplitude problem where the celestial horizon answer was marked correct, an azimuth problem where the uninterpolated bearing was marked correct, a latitude question where the 1215 position was marked correct instead of the asked for 1200 position, and a time of LAN where the mer pass time was marked correct. Still, those are slot machine odds.