Cheaters foiled at grade 12 exams

[geovalin]

Chhay Channyda

A year ago, a simple bribe would have allowed Sam Sophat* to walk into the grade 12 national exam with a broadsheet-sized compendium of answers, his smooth passage to higher education assured.

The decision to postpone, one that left him facing an exam taken under much stricter conditions, was one he rued yesterday.

“I count myself as really unlucky [that I waited],” said Sophat, 18, just before going into an examination hall in the capital at the start of the two-day testing period yesterday.

After years of rampant answer-selling, test leakage and bribery, students seeking their diploma this year have been warned that no irregularities will be tolerated. But as just over 93,000 candidates entered the exam sites, their pockets checked and phones taken away, threats of immediate failure and even jail time didn’t stop a few desperate pupils from trying to cheat their way through.

Proctors yesterday exposed three would-be test-takers as they attempted to sit the exam on behalf of others. Two suspects were arrested in Kandal and another in Svay Rieng, according to Minister of Education Hang Chuon Naron. The real diploma candidates meanwhile automatically failed and will be banned from taking the test again for another two years.

In Kampot, one brazen examinee snuck his smartphone into the exam hall and, while looking up solutions to the test questions, was caught by a monitor. The student found himself swiftly ejected.

“There were a number of students who tried to bring in answer sheets or phones,” said Kol Preap, executive director of Transparency International. “But the amount of students who were able to cheat successfully has significantly dropped.”

During last year’s tests, more than half a million dollars in bribes was funnelled to teachers in exchange for cheat sheets and leaked exam copies posted on Facebook, according to an NGO study.

This time around, however, Naron said that after limiting creation of the test to a small group of government employees, he remains “very confident” no leakage could occur.

Copies that did manage to circulate yesterday were declared by the ministry to be fakes. The Anti-Corruption Unit, which has been enlisted to help monitor the exam, arrested two print shop owners in Takeo after the pair allegedly tried to sell fake copies of five subjects, charging $100 for the bundle.

On a Facebook page called "This Year’s Grade 12 Exam", someone claiming to be an anonymous administrator put up an alleged copy of the chemistry test, but education officials likewise denied the authenticity.

“We are investigating the leakages to see if they are true copies,” said Rong Chhun, president of the Cambodian Independent Teacher’s Association, adding that he had heard a copy of the history test was also leaked in Prey Veng.

In line for the test at Chaktomuk Secondary School in the capital yesterday morning, 18-year-old Bopha* and her classmates discussed ways to smuggle in a cheat sheet full of equations. The candidates had to wait over an hour just to be admitted to the centre prior to the exam as the proctors and monitors checked student’s pockets and confiscated anything that wasn’t a ruler or pen, depriving them even of blank scrap paper.

Bopha managed to tuck the equation list into the waistband of her pants and quietly walk into the centre, but dared not run the heist any further; after discussing with her friends, she threw the sheet into a dustbin.

“It’s damn strict this year,” she said.

ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY LAIGNEE BARRON

* Names changed to protect their identities.

 

http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/cheaters-foiled-grade-12-exams

 

 

[Thighlander]

I'm sure the proctors had plenty of experience with cheating, and knew exactly what to look for.  I've told several dozen of my students, over the years:  "I was born during the daytime; but, it wasn't yesterday."

Edited August 5, 2014 by Thighlander

[Gettingaround]

"Bopha* and her classmates discussed ways to smuggle in a cheat sheet full of equations." - there's a really easy way to get the equations into the exam hall. REMEMBER THE DAMN THINGS!!

[geovalin]

Not all happy with tough test

Wed, 6 August 2014

Laignee Barron and Chhay Channyda

At the conclusion of the two-day grade 12 national exams yesterday, the Ministry of Education declared its crusade to end rampant cheating on the test a success. Many diploma-seeking candidates, however, had an entirely different take: disappointment.

“That was the hardest test in the world,” said one student after he had finished writing all seven subjects.

To ensure none of the typically widespread bribery and cheat sheet-sharing took place this year, military police patrolled the perimeter of each of the 154 testing sites, students were patted down before entering and tests were monitored by multiple proctors as well as independent volunteer observers recruited by the Anti-Corruption Unit.

Print shops near schools were also shuttered, and students reported that despite their best efforts, they could procure only obviously fake exam copies.

One of the test-takers at the capital’s Tuol Tom Pong High School yesterday got so anxious he slapped a female exam monitor after she told him to stay in his seat when he peaked over a classmate’s shoulder, other students said. The nervous tester then fled the school and, because he didn’t come back, flunked the exam.

“This year, a lot of students are going to fail, but at least since there will be so many of us, there will be an excuse to tell our parents,” said Kim Pich*, 18.

While Education Minister Hang Chhuon Naron announced that there had been “no corruption or test leakage” this year, some of the students reported differently.

“We all cheated from each other [by passing around answers] during the test,” said Rith Sovann*, another Tuol Tom Pong test-taker. “In every subject, there’s at least one or two good students and they took pity on us bad students. The proctor has one eye open and one eye closed; they want us to pass.”

Sovann, who wants to go to college to study IT, said that his chances are now “hopeless” but agreed with classmates that at least they can pocket money their parents had supplied in case a bribe opportunity presented itself.

* Names changed to protect their identities