The online disclosure of college admittance high-school exams has led to nationwide disruptions in Egypt and Algeria. Despite vows by authorities to make sure tests are secure, exam questions have been leaked prior to exam administration in both countries for several years. An October decree by President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi called for prison sentences for unauthorized disclosure of testing materials. But that decrees has failed to deter a cluster of Facebook groups that have leaked exam questions.

The state of Egypt’s public schools is an essential indicator of the ways in which the Egyptian revolution has not reached its citizens. In fact, private tutoring has now become Egypt’s de facto education system. A number of teachers have admitted, unofficially, that they teach the strict minimum in class so as to be able to recuperate these same students in private tutoring sessions. According to some estimates, Egyptian families spend over 1 billion dollars in private classes to compensate for the poor level of education: a cost which comes to almost a quarter of the family income.

Thousands rallied behind a top-ranked student in a potential case of injustice and corruption. The student, who had achieved nearly perfect marks in previous years, scored zero out of 100 on all seven exams that she sat. The family believes that she is a victim of corruption and that her papers were swapped with another pupil’s.