In the media

The Rwanda National Examinations Council (RNEC) has stepped up efforts to crack down on academic fraudsters. The organisations will have to pass academic testimonials of all applicants to RNEC for scrutiny before they select the competent employees.

The university "Laique Advantiste de Kigali" (Unilak) has defied a directive from the Education ministry requiring it to submit academic credentials of recruited lecturers for verification. According to sources in the ministry, the university leadership continues to recruit students. Unilak secured a provisional license but the ministry nevertheless refused to grant it the degree-awarding accreditation, citing lack of capacity to provide quality education.

The Department of Education has organized a campaign to urged parents of public and private school students to join the government in its fight against corruption. The department has launched a new Graft and Corruption Prevention Education Teaching Exemplars (GCPETE) which will be used by public school teachers to integrate anti-graft and corruption lessons in values education for elementary and schools.

Thousands of teenagers are trying to cheat their way into university by plagiarising stories and phrases from the internet. One in 20 of Britain's brightest young brains is copying material from the web according to a study done by the Universities and Colleges Admission Service. The study, which involved examining 50,000 personal statements, found that 5% used material from the internet, most from one free website, but direct copying of large chunks was rarer - less than 1%.

The Education department must explain why it let a student loan company that an audit had found improper millions of dollars. The loan company received the payments through a subsidy program that guaranteed a 9.5 percent interest rate on student loans. In an accord reached in January, the department allowed it to keep the $278 million it had received but suspended future payments of more than $800 million until a future audit could determine whether the company was eligible for the money.

A report from Fundación Grupo Civico Etica y Transparencia (EyT) was elaborated to show the results of the "Corruption Prevention in the Education System project". After monitoring large construction contract processes related to the maintenance of schools in rural areas, EyT found that a significant part of the Ministry of Education's public contracting budget had irregularities. It advised the Ministry to strengthen the quality control of materials and conduct regular internal audits.

After several media reports that thousands of the Makerere university's alumni are potential fraudsters, several employers are contacting the transcript office for verification of academic documents. According to an officer at the Academic Registrar's office, bankers, customs officials and journalists have forged their paths to jobs they should never have had at all.

A student at a university in Osh is elected by his classmates to pay the bribes necessary for his classmates to get the grades they want. Typically, a student who chooses to buy an education pays about $40 to $50 per semester. Many professors are willing to accept bribes simply to meet basic needs. Salaries for teachers rarely exceed $100 a month.

The Ministry of Education (MOE) has ordered the auditing of university heads from 2007. Analysts say the move is aimed at curbing corruption in universities after several embezzlement cases were uncovered in state universities recently. In 2006, former president of Tianjin University was removed from his position of deputy to the National People's Congress for his role in the school's loss of 12.8 million U.S. dollars.

A total of 2,032 primary school books have been stolen in Muhanga District between December 19 last year and February 3. The books were stolen by unidentified people and are suspected to be on sale in Muhanga and Kigali City.