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CAA to change ATPL exam method

ATPL exams

The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) will be changing the way it runs ATPL Theoretical Knowledge Examinations from 14 August 2017. The changes are being made across EASA states, and have already been put in place in Australia and New Zealand.

The new platform is called Quadrant and it will have four styles of questions:

  • Multiple-choice – the current question style where the candidate selects a single answer from four options
  • Multi-select – candidates must select options from a list to correctly answer the question. This question style will replace some of the current questions where a list of numbered options is provided in the question stem – and the candidate must select the correct group of options in the answer
  • Inline – involves the correct completion of sentences using a dropdown menu containing words, numbers, or a combination of both
  • Text – type-in-the-answer questions requiring the input of keystrokes. This style may be used to answer calculation-type questions, or questions requiring the extraction of data from a chart or table.

The CAA says all questions will be reviewed to ensure their suitability to be delivered in this manner and to make sure it does not disadvantage the candidate. The CAA has also confirmed it will be monitoring candidates’ comments made during and at the end of each exam to identify questions that may require amending or withdrawing.

The first exam to be affected is Air Law on 14 August 2017, with others being rolled out in following weeks.

The CAA has a presentation on its website about the new style exams including this video:

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2 comments

  • Gerard says:

    Fine, but I would suspect that although you know the subject matter, you may have to try and understand the foreign interpretation of the English language and secondly if the question asked is outside the L.O.’s why is the question there in the first place?

  • Petri Louhivuori says:

    It’s very important that the text is “simple” clear English. The challenge should never be to understand correctly the question, but to answer the subject matter correctly. In the multi-choice and -select cases the alternatives should measure the subject knowledge and not how well the possibly complicated text that possibly plays with words is understood. This is challenging but not unreasonable as a great number of pilots throughout EU will be using the English version of the tests.

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