Designing and Printing IBM 1230 Optical Mark Scoring Reader Answer Sheets by Photo-Offset

Abstract

EDUCATIONAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL MEASUREMENT 1966, 26, 729-731. THE new IBM Optical Mark Scoring Reader can eliminate cumbersome hand key punching jobs. This machine when used with its key punch attachment (the 534 Key Punch), is capable of quick and accurate' automatic transfer of information from special answer/response sheets to IBM cards. These answer/response sheets are coded with ordinary number 2 pencils. However, when they are designed and supplied commercially, the cost is high and delivery is slow.Thanks to an attempt at printing the answer sheets by Max Ferder of Borough of Manhattan Community College, the writer has been able to develop a procedure for designing and printing them by photo-offset. Thus, not only costs can be reduced, but also individual code sheets can be provided for the specific demands of a single research project.It is specified that the answer sheets must be in two colors-the response positions in a reflective ink and the timing check marks in the right margin in a non-reflective ink (black). However, twocolor printing is not really necessary. Answer sheets can be made by ordinary photo-offset if the black ink is kept light. The surest way to guard against dark printing is to have the printer use the process newspapers employ to reduce the blackness of a picture. In this process, black areas are reduced to areas of small dots, barely visible to the naked eye. When this process is used on the response section of an answer sheet, the black ink is reduced to a shade of gray and the timing marks remain a heavy shade of black. A hue at