PVCC Testing Center Offers a Regulated and Welcoming Environment

The PVCC Testing Center, located in room M607 of the Main Building, offers a variety of testing services for PVCC students and people in the larger Charlottesville community. 

For PVCC students, the Testing Center is a place where students with special needs can receive testing accommodations, take English as a second language or ESL tests, Spanish placement tests, or do makeup tests with special permission from instructors. This spring, the Testing Center is open Monday to Thursday from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. and 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Fridays. PVCC also offers a professional testing and certification center, including Pearson VUE, Prov, or Kryterion licensure and certification exams for people in the Charlottesville area. There are hundreds of different exams offered by these companies for people with different jobs to get certified or licensed.

The Testing Center has rules meant to ensure the integrity of the tests that students may need to familiarize themselves with before starting their test. Students are not allowed to bring any electronics into the testing room, but there are a few exceptions. Students must have a phone with them to access Canvas, but they are told to bring the phone out after logging in. According to the PVCC Testing Coordinator, Amy Floyd, students are allowed to bring things like calculators that instructors permit, but these devices are checked for hidden notes or other signs of cheating, and the Testing Center provides calculators, pens, pencils, highlighters, and scratch paper for test takers to use. Test takers must bring photo identification and are under observation while taking their tests.

Where there are tests, there will always be test takers looking to game the system, and the employees at the Testing Center occasionally catch students cheating. “We actually have a sign out in the testing area that says how many days it’s been since we caught someone cheating,” said Floyd. “We normally start over at the beginning of the semester. I’m happy to report that we haven’t caught anybody cheating yet this semester.”

All this may seem overwhelming, but Floyd said she is committed to ensuring a welcoming environment for students who may be intimidated by the Testing Center: “We try to calm students who may be really, really nervous. We try to make them feel comfortable, and we try to encourage the students and cheer for them.”