The challenge: assessment software that had to do more than a quick quiz
artra trains labour market professionals: staffing consultants, secondment specialists, recruiters and HR professionals. It offers more than 150 courses and programmes for working professionals, and several of those programmes prepare participants for the external SEU exam, the professional exam for the Dutch staffing industry. That gives assessment two jobs at artra. Show whether a participant has mastered the material from practice and the course, and get participants ready for the exam.
Marta Nokkert-Dabrowska is Research, Learning & Development Training Specialist at artra. She is a trainer, develops courses and builds the tests herself. Of all her colleagues, she works with Remindo the most.
A few years ago artra moved to a new platform for its e-learning, which came with a basic test feature. artra used it briefly. For an extensive item bank and questions differentiated by Bloom's taxonomy, it fell short. Not because it was bad, but because it offered too little for the growth artra was going through.
The solution: an assessment platform that adapts to a training provider
artra was looking for a partner that could implement its assessment and think along about what a commercial training provider needs. That led artra to Remindo. artra has been a customer since 2022.
What artra was looking for will sound familiar to many training providers. A large item bank that stays organised. Questions you can classify by cognitive level using Bloom's taxonomy. Insight into how a question or topic performs, so a test result also says something about the course itself.
Marta assumed Remindo mainly worked with schools and traditional education providers. That is exactly why it stood out to her that the platform also takes question quality into account.
“The quality of the questions is taken into account too. That matters to me, it's a discipline in its own right.”
The thinking along soon became concrete. In its previous assessment setup, artra used tags to organise questions, and that was important to the team. Marta raised it and Remindo responded with a tag feature within Remindo. She now builds tests from the entire question database, without linking separate folders.
“I've got that tag and it works like a dream for us. (...) It's not just: here's a product, go and do something with it. You think along with us and look at what matters to us.”
artra has also put its own foundations in order. Questions are split across item banks per topic and labelled with tags.
“As a training provider, it's important to have your own house in order behind the scenes.”
On top of that, the switch to Remindo went more smoothly than Marta had expected.
The result: 50% less time on test construction, and test analysis that improves the courses
For artra, a test does not end at pass or fail. After every test round, Marta analyses the results in Remindo, and that analysis feeds back into the courses.
How does artra use test analysis to improve its courses?
After each test, artra checks whether a question was well phrased, whether the course material explains the topic clearly enough and whether participants consistently score lower on a particular topic. A weak question gets revised. A weak topic can lead to revised course material or even a new course.
“It's a kind of loop for us. On the one hand we test, then we analyse what was tested. And I always look in the mirror: did I phrase that question well?”
artra did not have these options before. With Bloom's taxonomy in Remindo, Marta also differentiates her questions by cognitive level.
Speed has changed as well. Because the item banks are in order, Marta can quickly build a test that matches what a business client wants to know about its employees.
“I can switch gears really quickly, and within 10 to 15 minutes I can put together a really good test that fits what the client wants.”
In numbers: artra spends 50% less time building tests, and Marta's efficiency has risen by 80%.
“The time I spend building tests has definitely halved. (...) My efficiency has genuinely gone up by 80%.”
artra does not only use Remindo for final tests. It has also set up interim tests and flashcards in Remindo. Participants reach Remindo through artra's website and see their result on screen straight away. Fortunately, artra has not had any complaints so far.
“No news is good news.”
We asked Marta what would happen if Remindo disappeared tomorrow. artra could still train people, of course. But test analysis is now part of how Marta designs her courses.
“We could still train people, of course. But we'd lose our quality tool, and we'd lose our flexibility in the questions and in building tests.”
“Remindo is steady, something we can always count on. And that's really important to me, for the future too.”