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Following a high-level meeting last Friday, top officers from the police service, the Ministry of Education and the Kenya National Examinations Council (KNEC) will be dispatched to six parts of the country to investigate reports of plans to cheat in the forthcoming national examinations. The chairman of KNEC warned principals against collecting money from parents to buy fake examination materials for their candidates.

Some 82 cases of professors listing their secondary school offspring as co-authors in academic papers have been unearthed by an investigation by South Korea’s ministry of education. According to a Korea Herald Editorial, “It is obvious why the professors included the names of their children in the papers. The merit of being co-authors of research papers gives them a good advantage in seeking to enter universities through special admissions programmes”. The discovery could lead to disciplinary action in some cases, under Korea’s strict research misconduct laws which cover author attribution of research papers.

Government officials are waging a twitter battle with parents who tweet questions from national tests being taken by primary pupils in England. The Department for Education wants any information on the content of Sats papers removed as pupils take the tests at various times over two weeks. Officials have been messaging parents since Monday asking them to remove tweets revealing question details. The DfE said it wanted to clamp down on cheating.

In South Africa, an incident at a school in Soweto revived the debate over false teacher qualifications. This week, a former primary school teacher stabbed a director who had suspended him. The teacher was dismissed after the school discovered, following a complaint from parents, that he had lied about his qualifications and had no diploma. According to the South African Council of Educators, dozens or even hundreds of teachers lie about their qualifications.

The new rules spelt out by the Education Cabinet Secretary to curb cheating in national examinations signal the government’s determination to restore credibility in the country’s education system. For the past few years, the country has been grappling with rising cases of examination cheating, which reached ridiculous levels last year to the point where the public lost faith in the sanctity of the exams as schools, candidates, parents, examiners, and education and security officers were all roped into the cheating loop. More bold action must be taken to restore the credibility of the exams.

In a recent radio interview, the education minister highlighted the national campaign currently undergoing preparation in her ministerial department aimed at students and their parents in order to make them aware of the fight against examination fraud, which is becoming increasingly common in schools. The minister stated that, despite the fact that cheaters are using increasingly sophisticated technology, the education sector is determined to fight this trend.

The Kenya National Examination Council has warned KCSE candidates and their parents against buying a fake Chemistry exam paper being circulated. The Council will intercept fake papers and take legal action against individuals found circulating and selling them.

Scandal and large scale cheating. Images of dozens of parents climbing the walls of an examination building to help their children was a scandal and spread like gun powder on the Web. Dozens of persons, mobile telephones and cheat sheets in hand, were to be seen hanging onto window sills of a building where end-of-term exams were being held.

Dozens of people were filmed scaling the walls of a school in Hajipur to fraudulently provide students with answers to exam questions. 

Most secondary school authorities handed over the first term report cards to their students with various remarks. Those who attended classes regularly and worked hard during the term had good averages while others who played games and occupied drinking spots during school hours brought home fake report cards to impress their parents. The "ghost" students were last Friday seen in cyber cafés scanning and modifying their reports cards.