Examination Malpractice

Compliments of the season, teachers and students of Steem, how is everyone? I hope we are still reading and learning even in this holiday, cos readers are leaders. I appreciate @nsijoro for this contest on examination malpractice, it came at the right time as students now look for shortcut to pass exams, reading culture has really dwindled, so I'll share my thoughts and experiences on it.

Examination malpractice is using aids, help or any material which is against the exams rule to write exams with the aim of passing. It is any act carries out purposefully whether directly or indirectly, to pass an exams. It is an illegal act that is done either before, during or after exams just to pass examination.

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Yes, examination malpractice comes with consequences. Few amongst which are:

Suspension of studies for a period of time:
If a student is caught in examination malpractice, the student might be forced by the exams committee or the school to suspend his or her studies for a whole and continue later while his or her mates have moved forward. This will lead to wastage of time because that period, time is wasted and also wastage of resources, as the student will be forced to pay school fees again and the student will also be forced to write that exams again.

Expulsion from school: Examination malpractice can also lead to expulsion from school. The culprit can be expelled from school and might have to start all over again in another school.

Ignorance in the subject or career field:
Examination malpractice tho can make a student pass, but the student or person might be ignorant in that subject or career field, and the negative effect will be on the society. Example, a medical student who passed through examination malpractice might not know what to do when faced with a patient in the surgery room or might diagnose a patient wrongly leafing to the death of the patient. Also, the person might not be able to defend his or her certificate and might not be able to deliver when employed.

Shame: Examination malpractice brings shame to the student, the school and even the family of the student. This shame or stigma might follow the person for a long time.

It encourages laziness: Examination malpractice makes other students decide to be lazy especially when the student who did it isn't punished when caught. The students will prefer to cut corners to pass exams rather than spend time to study.

It destroys the value of education in a country and makes the certificate of that country not to be valued: Examination malpractice if not tackled rightly destroys the value of education in a country. Such countries will not value education because they know that the students or graduates did not study to pass the exams. Also, graduates from that country would always be rejected for jobs because it is believed they didn't study to pass the exams.

Cancellation of the exams centre which might affect innocent students too: Examination malpractice leads to cancellation of the paper and even the centre of exams. This affects both the innocent students and the guilty ones, example in unified tertiary matriculation examination (utme) that students take to be admitted into the university, it is always the whole centre that is cancelled.

I can say truthfully that I have asked someone a question in exams before, that is waec and then, I thought it was just normal to ask if you don't know. I thought that examination malpractice was when you copy something inti the exams hall but I also have seen different cases of examination malpractice, I'll explain few.

• When I got admitted into the university, in my year one, I had a roommate that was in year 4. She usually spent over 2 to 3 hours copying things from her note or textbook into a paper and sometimes on her laps. That was my first time of seeing someone spending hours just to prepare for examination malpractice.

• I also knew a friend who was in year 3 studying medicine, his friend had grabbed his paper, according to him, when the supervisor wasn't looking and his friend was caught with the two scripts. They were both given severe punishment which affected their year of graduation.

• As a teacher, I have caught students committing examination malpractice. One of my students was intelligent but she was always feeling lazy to read. So before exams, she will copy things into a paper and then bring it out during exams. Other students might see her but will be scared to report but the teachers usually know because she copies verbatim from what is in the note.

• I have also caught my student carrying her script up as if she is reading in the exams hall while another student at the back copied it.

Dubbing: This is when a student copied from another student or from a foreign material brought into the exams hall. This is very common in some exams especially external and internal exams in secondary schools.

Dubbing
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Expo: This is gotten from the word 'expose'. It is when the students see the questions on the subject or course to be taken before the exams. This is very common in internal and some external exams. Infact, some schools are exams centres so before the day of exams or on the day of exams before the time for the exams, some students must have seen the questions.

Missile catch: This is gotten from the word, 'missile', an object thrown into the air. It is writing on a piece of paper, folding it and throwing in the direction of a particular student or to some students. They will get it, copy before throwing away or even chewing the paper so as not to be caught.

Body aids/tattoo: This refers to copying the note related to the subject or course to be taken on any part of the body like the arms or laps or even palms.

Table top: This is very common amongst secondary school students. Since they sit according to their exams number or they sit on their lockers, they will copy notes in relation to the subject to be taken on top of their lockers. Then they will use their answer script to cover and copy from there when the examiner is t looking.

We also have other examples like the invigilator, teacher or examiner reading out the objective answers to students according to the alphabets example number 1. Akon, 2. Bassey, 3. Edet

Then we have students copying answers into materials related to the exams example a student copying formulas into his four figure table because the four figure table is allowed.

Causes of examination malpractice

• Laziness and unpreparedness: Students do not read because they feel lazy and think reading is hard.

• Attitude of teachers and invigilators or supervisors: The attitude of the people supervising leads to examination malpractice. A student who knows the supervisor is strict will not try to cheat during exams but when they know the supervisor loves money, they will pay money to cheat.

• Attitude of parents and teachers to students academia: The attitude of teachers or parents is also a cause of concern. Parents who do not make it compulsory for their children to study when they come back from school can make the children practice examination malpractice and schools that do not punish severely for it will cause the students to depend solely on examination Malpractice.

• Lack of self confidence in the student: A student that is not confident of himself or herself will always resort to examination malpractice. So students should be taught how to be confident of themselves. They should be encouraged to write their exams by themselves and without any foreign material.

• Lack of teachers who are well versed in the subject area: A school has to employ teachers who are well versed in the subject area so that he or she can teach to the understanding of the students, because we're students do not understand what the teacher is reaching, they will want to cheat to pass especially in external exams.

• Underpayment of staff or unpaid salaries: Though people might not really want to talk about this, but this is one of the reason for exam malpractice. This is because when government or school owners underpay or do not pay their workers, the workers will want to get money to feed their families so they will get money from from students and allow them do anything.

• Reading culture should be encouraged and made compulsory. When this is done, students will sit up and not reply on exams malpractice.

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• Professional teachers should be employed: Employing just anyone to pay them meagre salary will only encourage examination malpractice. So professional teachers who knows their subject areas very well should be employed to deliver and they should be paid well.

• Students should be punished severely when caught. This will serve as a deterrent to others.

• Teachers and supervisors or lecturers caught aiding examination malpractice should be severely punished. This will teach others not to do it.

• Students should be made to sit in a way that they can't ask anyone anything in the exams hall.

• More infrastructures and teaching materials should be provided. Imagine having a general subject which at least 3 different department are offering in a small hall and about 500 students in attendance. The lecturers might not be able to deliver well and some students may not hear what the lecturer us saying, si at the end, they resort to exams malpractice to pass. So more infrastructures and teaching materials should be provided.

It's quite sad that examination malpractice has eaten deep into our educational system. As a teacher, I see a lot and fir it to be stopped, all hands must be on deck. This is because currently, even pupils in the nursery/primary schools engage in it. To some students, from primary to tertiary, reading is outdated. This is not supposed to be so.