During your school or college exams, you may have filled the test or exam paper with pencils and marked them with black bullets. That method is still relevant and widely used by institutions during entrance examinations. But, are you aware of the technology used to process those papers and do the scoring? It is Optical Mark Recognition or OMR technology.
More on OMR
Several examination bodies and academic institutes leverage OMR technology to capture human-marked data from exams, surveys, or tests. In particular, it is used in exams that involve a huge number of candidates to evaluate data with consistency and accuracy.
The OMR sheet scanner scans the entire sheet to provide results quickly. The OMR readers used to scan the sheet can read multiple-choice questions from hundreds of sheets in no time. Apart from MCQ, it also helps record names, ID numbers, and other non-multiple-choice data accurately.
How does an OMR device work?
The OMR device uses an OMR sheet scanner to scan the OMR sheet. It focuses a light beam on the paper and identifies areas of minimal light transmission. These include marked areas that reflect less light than blank zones. Thus, the scope of errors is less than 1%.
Features of OMR Software
The OMR device accompanies numerous features, making it relevant to date:
- It is compatible with any scanner
- Ensures high speed and accuracy
- Instant reporting and analysis
- Processes double-sided forms
- Free flexibility for sheet designing
You can say that an OMR device is a one-stop solution for all your offline exams.
OMR Device: Applications
The applications of an OMR reader are endless. Let’s check out the prominent ones:
- Applications and Documents: The OMR software can capture checkbox data from many different kinds of application forms. The application form can be a government application, loan application, new bank member application, job application, etc.
- Voting and Elections: OMR technology can help to count and process paper ballots during elections. Voters mark their choices on the ballot paper, and the OMR software scans and tabulates the votes, ensuring a quick and reliable vote-counting process.
- Questionnaires, Surveys, and Assessments: Companies, government agencies, and educational institutions use surveys to gather information from their customers, students, or citizens. The OMR device collects the data and stores it accurately in the computer.
- Medical Forms: The healthcare industry uses data to get information from patients, insurance forms, appointment applications, and treatment forms. The OMR sheet scanner can help to streamline their data input processes in a manner that anyone can easily extract whenever required.
- Tests, Quizzes, and Exams: An OMR sheet scanner captures “fill-in-the-bubble” data for multiple-choice questions used in colleges and high schools. It can read thousands of sheets in minutes. It further assists teachers in grading and storing papers quickly and accurately.
This technology is immensely useful, as it reduces not only manpower but also the overall cost required to process the documents. Most importantly, it saves you considerable time.
Why has OMR become the technology of choice?
An OMR device offers several advantages over the traditional method of paper evaluation. Let’s focus on the most eminent of these benefits:
- Scanning is fast: An OMR scanner can scan around 1,500 to 10,000 forms per hour. A single PC workstation is enough to control and process this activity. It can handle any volume that the scanner can generate. When you want to Increase the throughput, just upgrade the OMR sheet scanner.
- Scanning is Accurate: OMR provides unmatched accuracy when reading data, thus eliminating transcription errors when done manually.
- Cost-effective: An OMR device can accomplish the most complicated administrative tasks rapidly and accurately from a central location. This minimises manpower and cuts down the operating costs.
- Easy to implement and support: As compared to many PC network installations, the technical support required for an OMR sheet scanner is minimal. An OMR device can also record on an OMR form even when a PC or network goes down.
Therefore, an OMR device simplifies the process of data collection and analysis. It saves time and effort, ensuring accuracy and reliability at its best. The OMR reader also offers the advantage of speed, accuracy, and cost-effectiveness for processing large volumes of data or documents.
The OMR device is effective in evaluating the examples where the responses are predefined. The candidates mark their responses in the specified circles or blocks instead of free-form handwriting or text. In the past few decades, OMR technology has succeeded beyond bars. To know more about the OMR reader, you can connect with OMR Home.
