Search Page

According to a professor from Nigeria’s Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), over 400 candidates seeking admission into higher education institutions across the country have been involved in admissions fraud. JAMB has discovered up to 96 cases of computer-based test irregularities in the North, with universities making changes to photographs and biometrics of candidates. This is contrary to a call by the Minister of Education who said institutions should not take any new photographs or biometrics of candidates after registration, in order to stop impersonations.

Between 1999 and 2006, 242 graduates in the Eastern Shandong province enrolled at universities using other people’s identities and college entrance scores. According to reports, dozens of people have been punished, but under existing laws, students cannot be charged with a crime. The National People’s Congress has received a proposal to criminalize exam fraud, and the Ministry of Education will work with authorities to investigate and hold students accountable.

Reports indicate that not only do Chinese students cheat on their college applications, but many continue even after they have arrived in the U.S. An admissions official at the University of Southern California recognized that he earned $40,000 from clients over the years by providing “false college transcripts with inflated grades,” “fraudulent personal statements,” and “phony letters of recommendation” for the applications of his Chinese clients.

The Court convicted officials of the Ministry of Education and Public Security for involvement in fraud over the 2018 high school national exams, where over 200 students from three northern provinces of Hoa Binh, had their results modified in the high school exam. Two other people were jailed for paying bribes to alter exam scores. After the fraud was exposed, dozens of students dropped out of top universities and others were expelled after their marks were corrected.

There is a massive fraud going on in Vietnam with education agents charging $5,000-10,000 upfront from the families for scholarships to US institutions. Larger agencies are more specialized in helping students gain admission to “highly selective colleges and universities”, with packages that include assistance with writing essays, completing them on behalf of students and other services, including creating extracurricular activities that their clients can add to their application.

After a surge in enrolment of international students, accompanied by a spike in cases of academic misconduct including plagiarism and using prohibited materials on exams, St. Clair College, in Windsor, created the position of academic integrity coordinator. Fanshawe College which had 852 academic offenses in 2016-18, with 907 the flowing year, plans to create a similar position.

Perth’s Murdoch University and other universities have become heavily reliant on foreign student fees to bolster their incomes. 50 professors from the Australian Research Council’s Laureate Fellowship condemned the decision to take legal action against an associate professor from the university. Deeply concerned about the integrity of academic teaching, the professor complained on television that the university was not only enrolling international students whose English was inadequate but also allow them to graduate.

Academics say the use of the electronic device is difficult to police in crowded exam halls. There has been an increased number of breaches of exam regulations, up from 56 last year to 83. Trinity College recorded 42 breaches of exam regulations this year, along with 10 incidents of cheating. This has prompted a number of UK colleges introduced blanket bans on wristwatches of any kind.