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See the full collection here: https://testcommunity.network/collections/16th-july-2026-weekly-global-news

This week's collection captures an assessment sector under pressure on several fronts at once. Artificial intelligence dominates the agenda, cutting both ways. Universities like NUS are harnessing AI to sharpen clinical training and Kolkata schools are using it to ease marking workloads, while Brown's cheating crisis, evidence of eroding maths skills, and South Korea's first criminal case over AI smart glasses show the same technology testing the limits of academic integrity. New York City has even paused edtech purchases until its AI guidance is finalised.

Test security and integrity run through many of the stories, from South Korea banning smart glasses in exam halls and India threatening five-year jail terms for digital exam leaks, to a widely shared film exposing cheating and more than 100 US Airmen demoted after an exam error. Alongside these sit a series of high-profile failures and disputes over exam administration: California counting the heavy cost of a failed bar exam rollout and settling with its testing vendor, Quebec's results portal crashing, Portugal's marking fiasco heading towards legal action, and OCR defending its refusal to re-mark a contested GCSE paper.

Elsewhere, the collection looks to the future of assessment itself. There are questions about whether institutions cling to flawed performance measures, debate over alternatives to the SAT and ACT, the University of California weighing Smarter Balanced scores for admissions, and India's 2027 NEET-UG moving to computer-based testing across more than 1,000 centres. Digital assessment's growing maturity is reflected in RM's extended ICAEW partnership and Talogy's tie-up with Symulate, while policy takes centre stage with Lithuania reversing its education reform and Bangladesh's Education Minister signalling a possible re-sit. Rounding things off, a Women in Leadership survey turns attention to equity and career progression across the assessment industry.

Taken together, the week paints a picture of a sector grappling with rapid technological change, heightened scrutiny of fairness and security, and a renewed appetite to rethink what good assessment really looks like.

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In this week's episode, Tim Burnett chats with Gelareh Keshavarz, EdD(c), CMP, President of the Athabasca University Graduate Students' Association and a Board of Governors member at Athabasca University, ahead of the IAEA conference in Toronto. They discuss:
- The "illusion of polish" — why finished, authoritative-looking AI-assisted work can hide the fact that nobody has questioned the thinking behind it
- Whether AI is an equaliser or a divider in education, and how it might be more of an agent of social change for learners with disabilities and difficulties than a leveller between rich and poor
- Why trust in AI comes down to judgement, not the tool itself — and how self-determined, "heutagogical" learning is helping practitioners build their own capability ahead of policy
Gelareh's doctoral research uses interpretive phenomenological analysis to explore how generative AI is reshaping the lived experience of multilingual educators, and the conversation ranges from cognitive laziness and hybrid AI-human work to the story of a finance professor in Kenya who taught herself qualitative research methods using AI.
Gelareh puts it simply: "What I have learned from using it is that it can take the lower-order thinking off my hands and handle the basics for me, so I can focus on my higher-order thinking. I am the boss. The decision-making is always mine." The episode closes with a reflection on "learning under the tree", and why the informal, in-person moments at conferences like IAEA can't be replaced by any article or polished presentation.
Connect with Gelareh Keshavarz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gelareh-keshavarz/
Connect with Tim Burnett on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tburnett/
IAEA Conference: https://www.eqao.com/iaea-annual-conference/
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Read the articles in full: https://testcommunity.network/collections/9th-july-weekly-update

This week's collection spans the fault lines running through assessment right now. Test security dominates, with Portugal suspending its national exam marking platform over security failings, the California DMV facing possible mass licence revocations over testing anomalies, and Maharashtra's MPSC defending its shift to online computer-based testing against student protests. AI runs through much of the rest — a student-built cheating-detection system, MonitorEDU's warning about the high cost of AI hype in proctoring, Bristol's "Pandora's box" reflections on Assessment in Focus, and a professor's unusual decision to award perfect scores in response to classroom AI use. Scale and speed feature too, from Learnosity's one billion assessments delivered to 47.5 million learners, to VTU announcing results five minutes after an exam. Alongside these sit thoughtful pieces on qualification design starting with "why?", the emerging AI divide as a new literacy test, "rehumaning" education beyond screen bans, fairness in Romania's Baccalaureate, the GPhC's renewed partnership with Surpass, the Surpass Programme 2026 lineup, and several podcasts on the future of AI-enabled work.

Disclaimer: This weekly update contains links to third-party websites and content that are not owned, operated or controlled by the Test Community Network. These links are provided for information and convenience only. The Test Community Network is not responsible for, and does not endorse, guarantee or accept any liability for, the accuracy, reliability, availability or content of any third-party site, nor for any products, services or views expressed on them. The inclusion of any link does not imply endorsement or affiliation. Any views expressed in the linked content are those of the original authors or publishers, not of the Test Community Network. Accessing third-party sites is done entirely at your own risk and subject to their own terms and privacy policies.

In this week's episode, Tim Burnett chats with Munira Mohammad, who leads a team of psychometricians, statisticians and academic experts at the Aga Khan University Examination Board (AKU-EB) — Pakistan's first private national board for secondary and higher secondary certificates. They discuss:

• Why digitising a high-stakes paper exam isn't simply an efficiency win — and how changing the modality risks changing the very thing you're trying to measure
• How AKU-EB closes the feedback loop with absolute marking, question-wise school performance reports, and a culture where students are never penalised for errors in the assessment tool
• Why the challenges facing the global North and South are far more alike than different, and what makes the IAEA conference such a valuable place to bounce ideas around

Munira offers a grounded, refreshingly honest look at digital transformation in assessment — one where efficiency and the chance to curb exam-paper leakage are weighed against fairness, the digital divide, and the trust that underpins every qualification. With unstable electricity and patchy internet still a reality even in big cities, she explains why a full switch from paper isn't on the table, and why the smarter question is whether to rethink the exam altogether rather than simply replicate it on screen. Tim shares the OECD's findings on the hidden burden of continuous assessment, and the two look ahead to meeting at the IAEA conference in Toronto this September.

Connect with Munira Mohammad on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/munira-mohammad-64879190/

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

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This week's global update covers 26 stories spanning test security and integrity (exam fraud scandals in Thailand, paper leaks in India, AI-enabled cheating with smart glasses), regulatory developments (EU AI Act updates, SQE evaluation, Portugal's digitalisation fallout), and professional credentialing (GPhC's renewed Surpass contract, ETS's acquisition of ACT, global certification trends). AI in assessment features heavily, from KPMG's internal ethics exam being gamed by AI to ProfPrep's AI-generated question banks, alongside broader debates on equity, standardised testing, and innovation in grading and result turnaround. Two podcast episodes round things out, exploring AI's disruption of assessment and the shift toward continuous certification in healthcare.

Disclaimer

The articles and resources featured in this collection are curated from third-party sources and are provided for informational purposes only. Test Community Network does not create, control, or endorse the content of external sites and is not responsible for their accuracy, opinions, or any consequences arising from their use. Links to external websites are provided as a convenience, and clicking them will take you outside the Test Community Network platform, subject to the third party's own terms and privacy policy.

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This week's update brings together 21 stories from across the global assessment landscape. Test security dominates the headlines, with 2.3 million students retaking India's medical entrance exam after a leak, Thai officials caught altering scores for bribes, and fresh calls for accountability that would place exam integrity squarely on the shoulders of institution heads. Elsewhere, we look at how AI is reshaping the field, from unlimited AI-generated practice questions to a thoughtful conversation on training doctors for an AI-saturated world. There's plenty on innovation and credentialing too, including specifications grading, a shifting CFA pass rate, a new Bar course replacing the CLP exam, and FAA certification for agricultural drone pilots. Add in podcasts on reinventing assessment from scratch, play-based learning and making public data usable for both humans and machines, and you have a snapshot of an industry grappling with integrity, technology and fairness all at once.

See the collection in full: https://testcommunity.network/collections/25th-june-2026-weekly-update

In this week's episode, Tim Burnett chats with Emily Worthington, Head of Programmes at Pearson VUE and 2026 Chair of the European Association of Test Publishers (E-ATP). They discuss:

- Why AI is forcing a fundamental rethink of assessment — and how the industry plans to rise to the challenge much as it did during the pandemic

- What's on the agenda for the E-ATP conference in Rome this October, including keynote speaker Dr Luca Longo's provocative "cheating or revealing" take on AI

- How E-ATP's volunteer-run model works, and the many ways to get involved — from attending and sponsoring to reviewing sessions and joining the committee

Emily shares why anyone touching assessment should have Rome on their radar this October. With the theme "building assessment for good," the conference brings together people from across education, government, regulators, medical organisations and psychometrics to tackle assessment's biggest challenge yet: the impact of AI on integrity and on what we actually measure. Emily walks through the packed agenda — pre-conference workshops (including Tim & Joscelyns's "year in AI" retrospect), parallel sessions, a hands-on discovery zone, and Dr Luca Longo's keynote on how AI will reshape assessment.

She also makes the case for the network you build along the way, and explains how volunteering is the perfect way to dip your toe in. Early bird registration closes on the 26th, so there's no time to lose.

Register for the E-ATP conference (Rome, 7–9 October 2026): https://www.eatpconference.eu.com/

Keynote speaker — Dr Luca Longo, University College Cork: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drlucalongo/

Connect with Emily Worthington on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emily-worthington10/

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

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In this week's episode, Tim Burnett chats with Ebrahim Talaee, Associate Professor and Assistant Dean for Curricular Assessment and Evaluation at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix, and a fellow ambassador for the IAEA's 51st Annual Conference in Toronto. They discuss:

How AI is being used to develop and clone medical multiple choice questions — and why content experts are given proven prompt templates rather than being asked to become prompt engineers

Why medical assessment cares about the reasoning process, not just the right answer, and how that shapes the way questions are written

Assessing doctors in an "AI-saturated environment": distributed cognition, epistemic judgement, and the risk of offloading too much thinking to the machine

Ebrahim works across two strands of assessment at Arizona: AI-assisted item development in the foundation years, and performance-based (workplace-based) assessment in the clinical clerkship years. He makes a compelling case that doctors now practise inside an environment where patients are triaged, histories summarised and examinations written up by AI before the clinician arrives — so medical education must train them to interrogate those outputs, not simply accept them. Tim and Ebrahim get into the over-reliance risk (with a memorable self-driving-car analogy), the move from "human in the loop" to expert in the loop, and Ebrahim's IAEA paper on making clerkship grading more valid. A thoughtful conversation on trust, transparency and technology — the very theme of this year's conference.

Learn more about the conference: https://www.eqao.com/iaea-annual-conference/

Connect with Ebrahim Talaee on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ebrahimtalaee/

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

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IAEA 2026: https://iaea2026.org

Anastasiya Lipnevich: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anastasiya-lipnevich/

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

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Welcome to the Test Community Network's weekly update for 18th June 2026. This week's collection spans 23 articles, podcasts, and research pieces from across the global assessment and education landscape. From the gaokao's place in a shifting job market and India's ongoing examination integrity challenges, to the growing regulatory scramble around AI in schools and fresh research on AI-powered assessment evidence — there is plenty to digest. We also cover exam access arrangements at Cambridge, the SAT's 100th anniversary, and a cyberattack hitting higher education institutions worldwide. As ever, the links below will take you directly to the original sources.

Disclaimer: The Test Community Network curates links to third-party content for informational purposes only. We have no control over the content, accuracy, or availability of external websites, and inclusion of a link does not imply endorsement of the views, products, or services expressed therein. The Test Community Network accepts no liability for any loss or damage arising from your use of, or reliance on, third-party content accessed via these links. Always exercise your own judgement when engaging with external sources.

Twenty stories this week. Here are the headlines.

Surpass has dropped version 26.1 with AI-powered item search and automated similarity detection. Tim Burnett's vibe coding talk from the EAA AI Symposium is now live as a podcast — including a moat analysis of 29 assessment vendors. And Globebyte has launched an audit-ready AI assessment platform built on Anthropic, with EU AI Act compliance baked in.

AI in marking remains a hot topic. Excelsoft compares India and the UK's approaches, while Turnitin shares insights from roundtables with The Open University, LSE, and others on shifting from AI policing to measuring learning integrity.

Test security dominates this week. China is screening gaokao students' eyeglasses for hidden tech. Ofqual warns that smart glasses and earpieces are making cheating harder to detect. In India, biometric verification caught an exam impersonator during the UPESSC TGT exam, and the wider system faces scrutiny after the NEET paper leak.

Ofqual is also monitoring the Edexcel A-level maths paper after 20,000 people petitioned calling it unfair.

Coursera's microcredentials report finds 60% of employers would hire a less experienced candidate with a gen AI credential over a more experienced one without. That's worth sitting with.

Two events for your diary: E-ATP in Rome, 7–9 October, and the EdTech Summit in Birmingham, 18–19 November.

Full stories at testcommunity.network.

Collection in full: https://testcommunity.network/collections/11th-june-2026-weekly-news-update