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This week's global news roundup spans 21 stories across the assessment, education and credentialing landscape. Test security dominates the headlines, with South Korea tightening exam rules after smart glasses cheating, Rwanda ordering over 7,000 students to retake national exams, and a new report urging an immediate ban on all remote unsupervised testing. India's examination system also faces scrutiny, with NEET-PG candidates reporting technical failures at test centres and JEE Advanced exploring a shift to adaptive testing by 2030.

AI in assessment continues to gather pace, with stories covering AI-powered item banking, human oversight of AI-generated medical assessments, ethical concerns around AI grading in South Korea, and new rules in New South Wales limiting take-home assessments to combat AI misuse. ATP's forward-looking report imagines what assessment might look like by 2040, while the EU AI Act introduces new watermarking obligations for AI-generated content.

Beyond the headlines, this collection also features insights on second-career teachers, the six transferable skills employers value most, portfolio-based assessment market growth, and talent mobility across Asia.

Disclaimer: The Test Community Network (TCN) curates and summarises third-party content for informational purposes only. The inclusion of any article, report, podcast or external link does not constitute endorsement, recommendation or verification of its accuracy by TCN. All third-party content remains the intellectual property of its respective authors and publishers. TCN accepts no responsibility or liability for the content, accuracy or availability of external sites linked within this collection. Readers are advised to exercise their own judgement when accessing third-party resources.

Welcome to this week's Test Community Network global weekly update. Here are the highlights:

AI & Assessment — Can AI mark video as well as text? We explore the next frontier in automated assessment. Plus, ATP looks ahead to what assessment might look like by 2040, and Credentialing Insights asks whether your AI policy is keeping pace with your AI adoption.

Regulatory & Compliance — The EU AI Act enters the watermarking era with new transparency obligations. Ofqual unpacks the national GCSE results picture, and CXC defends the validity of its new CTEC exam amid scrutiny.

Test Security & Integrity — Cirrus Assessment examines fairness risks when candidates choose between remote proctoring and test centres. We also feature Certory's human-first proctoring model and XProctor's AI-assisted integrity platform. And the BBC answers the question everyone's wondered: where does your exam actually go after you've finished it?

Assessment Innovation — RM puts candidate experience at the centre of its digital expansion, CISCE launches a learning pattern tracking initiative in India, and IWCF's digital badging case study shows what modern credentialing looks like in practice.

The Big Read — The New York Times argues the only way to stop cheating is to redesign the assessment itself.

All links and full summaries are available at testcommunity.network.

Disclaimer: This update includes links to third-party websites, podcasts, and publications. The Test Community Network does not control, endorse, or accept responsibility for the content, accuracy, or availability of any external sites or resources. Views expressed in linked content are those of the respective authors and organisations and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Test Community Network. Accessing third-party links is at your own discretion and risk.

This week's global roundup covers exam security under the spotlight — from AI-enabled cheating and leaked papers to GPS-tracked test transport — alongside developments in proctoring fairness, assessment platform innovation, and the growing push for stronger regulation in the age of AI. We also feature job opportunities, conference registration, and a significant UK government tender for AI skills.

Disclaimer:

The Test Community Network curates links to third-party content for informational purposes only. We have no control over the content, availability, or accuracy of external websites and do not endorse the views, products, or services they contain. Linking to a third-party site does not imply any association with or endorsement by its operators. You access external links at your own discretion.

This week's collection covers 24 stories from across the global assessment landscape. AI continues to dominate the headlines — South Korea's Insurance Institute has moved to 100% AI-generated exam questions, colleges in the US are quietly integrating AI into admissions, and universities from Edinburgh to Sheffield Hallam are wrestling with whether policing AI use is even worth the effort. Meanwhile, test security remains a persistent challenge worldwide, with large-scale fraud cases in Thailand and West Africa, smart device cheating in Cambodia, and a high-tech racket involving ChatGPT and hidden cameras in India. On the regulatory front, Ofqual has fined OTHM £25,000 for malpractice investigation failures, and the new US bar exam rollout has hit turbulence. There's also a thought-provoking piece on whether students still learn better from paper, a podcast exploring the future of credentialing, and research charting assessment's evolution from foundational ideas to systems thinking.

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Disclaimer: The Test Community Network curates and summarises third-party content for informational purposes only. We do not control, endorse, or accept responsibility for the accuracy, content, or availability of external sites linked in this collection. Views expressed in linked articles, podcasts, and reports are those of their respective authors and publishers, not the Test Community Network. Readers access third-party links entirely at their own risk.

This week's global news roundup takes in a bar exam cancellation in Washington State and the fallout that followed, Ofqual's £150,000 fine against EAL for repeated qualification failures, and a cyber-attack affecting over 600,000 records at England's Department for Education. Elsewhere, WAEC withholds more than 167,000 WASSCE results over malpractice, Kenya rolls out blockchain-verified exam certificates, and universities continue to move away from AI detectors in favour of redesigned assessments. Read on for the full round-up.

Disclaimer:

The articles, podcasts and other content featured in this collection are curated from third-party sources and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the Test Community Network. Links are provided for informational purposes only, and the Test Community Network is not responsible for the accuracy, completeness, or content of external websites. Readers should verify any information independently before relying on it.

In this episode of the Test Community Network podcast, I sat down with Amina Afif, Executive Secretary of FLIP+ and The International Association for Educational Assessment 2026 Conference Ambassador for Western Europe.Amina has spent twenty years working across Luxembourg, Seychelles, and international organisations like the OECD and IEA. Her perspective is unlike anyone else I've spoken to on the pod. She sits right at the crossroads of assessment design and what actually happens when that data lands on a school leader's desk.We got into:📊 Why even the richest countries still can't close the gap between good data and good decisions🤖 Norway's AI ban, Sweden's phone restrictions, and why blaming the tool misses the point🤝 Why trust, not technology, is the factor that determines whether assessment actually improves learningWe'll both be at IAEA 2026 in Toronto this September. If you're going, come and say hello.Register for the IAEA Conference: https://iaea2026.org/hashtag#Assessment hashtag#EdTech hashtag#EducationData hashtag#IAEA2026 hashtag#FLIPplus hashtag#TestCommunityNetwork hashtag#SchoolImprovement hashtag#AIinEducation

See the collection in full: https://testcommunity.network/collections/30th-july-2026-weekly-global-news

This collection spans the key themes shaping the testing and assessment landscape: AI's growing impact on exams and academic integrity, persistent exam security challenges across India and the US, regulatory shifts affecting credentialing bodies and school assessment in the UK, and emerging market trends in K-12 testing. Podcasts and thought leadership pieces explore whether traditional exams remain fit for purpose, how HR is adapting to a changing world of work, and what new approaches to assessment design look like in an AI-driven era.

Disclaimer

This collection is curated by the Test Community Network (TCN) for informational purposes only. The views, opinions, and content expressed in the linked articles, podcasts, and resources are those of the respective authors, publishers, and content creators and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of the Test Community Network. TCN does not endorse, verify, or accept responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of any third-party content linked herein. All third-party trademarks and content remain the property of their respective owners. Links are provided for convenience and educational interest; their inclusion does not imply affiliation with or endorsement by TCN.

This week's round-up spans the shifting global landscape of assessment, from tougher anti-cheating measures in Spain and a spy-style pen-cam racket in Punjab, to fresh debates about AI's role in authoring items and shaping student motivation. We look at test anxiety and its effect on performance, industrial action at AQA over pay, and licensing changes for optometrists in Kentucky. Elsewhere, questions of fairness surface repeatedly — Ontario's dynamic online maths test, single-date entrance exams and educational inequality, and exam-driven protests in India. Add in facial recognition tied to exam eligibility, the EU AI Act's implications for schools, and the hidden costs of in-house exam printing, and you have a snapshot of an assessment world grappling with security, technology, equity and reform all at once.

Disclaimer

The articles featured in this collection are curated from third-party sources and are shared for information and discussion purposes only. Links to external websites are provided for convenience; the Test Community Network does not own, control, endorse, or take responsibility for the content, accuracy, opinions, or availability of any third-party material. The views expressed in the linked articles are those of their respective authors and publishers, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Test Community Network. We accept no liability for any loss or damage arising from reliance on external content. If you believe any link is broken, outdated, or inappropriate, please contact us.

Full News Collection: https://testcommunity.network/collections/23rd-july-2026-weekly-global-news

Read the Article with Vali: https://testcommunity.network/the-social-lift

In this week's episode, Tim Burnett chats with Vali Huseyn, Regional Assessment Expert for Central Asia and the Caucasus, who works with governments and ministries across the region to reform large-scale assessment. They discuss:

• Why Kazakhstan has become Central Asia's assessment pioneer — digitising exams while shifting the culture from knowledge-based to competency-based assessment
• How Kazakhstan's National Testing Center solved the digital infrastructure bottleneck by splitting university admission into five sittings across the year, giving candidates multiple attempts
• Assessment as a "social lift" — how fair, merit-based assessment drives social mobility and sends a wider message about justice in society

Vali brings deep regional knowledge, along with the linguistic and cultural fluency to understand what each jurisdiction actually needs. He explains why Kazakhstan's heavy investment in higher education — some twenty-five to thirty new campuses, including international branches — created the push for modernisation, and how different countries handle the relationship between school-leaving and university admission exams. He also shares why he's taking the themes of transparency and fairness to the IAEA conference in Toronto this September, and offers a memorable reflection on what these gatherings really offer: the rare chance to travel far in your own thoughts, like a long journey with different stops along the way.

Register for the IAEA conference in Toronto: https://www.iaea2026.org

Connect with Vali Huseyn on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/valihuseyn/

Connect with Tim Burnett on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tburnett/

If you would like to join Tim on a future episode or sponsor the Test Community Network then get in touch with Tim to schedule a call: https://calendly.com/educationtech/15min-teams-chat

Events: https://www.testcommunity.network/upcoming-events

Podcasts: https://www.testcommunity.network/podcasts

Marketplace: https://www.testcommunity.network/marketplace

Subscribe to the Test Community Network here: https://www.testcommunity.network

In this week's episode, Tim Burnett goes solo to dig into AQA's new research report, Evaluating AI‑Authored Assessment Items for High-Stakes Exams, and to challenge the way it approached generating items with AI. Drawing on his own research sprint and recent workshops with awarding organisations, he sets out what the report gets right, where he thinks it falls short, and what it really takes to author good assessment items with generative AI. They discuss:

• Why testing AI "out of the box" misses the point — the success of AI item generation lives in the process (the prompts, the harness, the expert input, the source anchoring), not the model alone. As Tim puts it, judging the items without considering how they were made is like comparing holidays without asking how they were booked.
• Where the research genuinely shines — the analysis of command words and item difficulty (with one-mark items faring better than three-mark items), the flagging of mark schemes as a major risk, and the useful concept of "surface plausibility" that can lull reviewers into missing confidently-wrong content.
• The practical techniques that actually make AI authoring work — capturing expert insight early, using personas for the minimum competent candidate, anchoring generation to precise source material to avoid hallucinations, checking for test-wiseness, and building "effort in the loop" by having SMEs answer the generated item themselves.

Tim also unpacks why so many awarding organisations are frustrated with vendor item-generation platforms (old models, slow output, no saved prompts and no audit trail), the important distinction between the assessment manager's technical role and the SME's domain expertise, and why AQA's own conclusion — that generative AI is best treated as a drafting accelerator within a controlled assessment lifecycle, not as an autonomous author — is spot on. He rounds off by introducing the new MCQ Leaderboard, his community project challenging the available AI models to see which produce the highest-quality items, and invites assessment professionals to contribute their own scores.

Read the AQA report, Evaluating AI‑Authored Assessment Items for High-Stakes Exams: https://aqaglobal.com/news/can-ai-write-exams-report

Understanding AI — A Guide for Assessment Professionals and Awarding Organisation Leaders (TCN, Edition 1, June 2026): https://testcommunity.network/download/PFX68LV6MGBP

A Practical Guide to Authoring Test Items with Artificial Intelligence (March 2026, Edition 1): https://testcommunity.network/download/28N3NT

Try the MCQ Leaderboard: https://leaderboard.testcommunity.network/

Connect with Tim Burnett on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tburnett/

If you would like to join Tim on a future episode or sponsor the Test Community Network then get in touch with Tim to schedule a call: https://calendly.com/educationtech/15min-teams-chat

Events: https://www.testcommunity.network/upcoming-events

Podcasts: https://www.testcommunity.network/podcasts

Marketplace: https://www.testcommunity.network/marketplace

Subscribe to the Test Community Network here: https://www.testcommunity.network