Daily Times

With the commencement of matriculation examinations in Sindh, cheating is once again in the news.

At the theoretical plane, there can be no doubt that it is a serious crime against society. The Government of Sindh claims that it is taking firm steps to curb the menace. Unfortunately, evidence to the contrary is all too visible.

Cheating is not something one can call unimportant or ignore. It is a vicious curse. It is demoralizing and corrupts a society beyond redemption.

As novelist Khaled Hosseini says, “when you speak a lie, you steal someone’s right to the truth. When you cheat, you steal the right of fairness”.

It is unfortunate that cheating in examinations is not universally considered a crime. Thus in vulgar style, we talk about a ‘culture’ of cheating. However, this use of the word is totally unfair and inaccurate. Sadly, many among us have chosen to turn a blind eye to this crime. Some of us even talk of accepting it as a norm. A few of us even defend it vehemently. Others, while acknowledging that it is a crime, blame it on the ‘system’ to absolve the individuals involved of the responsibility.

Let us consider the factors which compel so many students to cheat in the examinations. The intellectual capabilities vary in every population. There will always be students with great understanding and learning and others who are not as good. The amount of effort students make also varies. Then there is the question of aptitude. Parents are too often guilty of pressuring their children to take up subjects they have no interest in. Such students cannot bring themselves to putting in their best effort.

And yet, all students are expected to do well. There is extreme pressure from one’s peers, from parents and from teachers to get good grades. Some of the students are thus tempted to cheat to produce the results that are acceptable even if they do not deserve those.

Also, the educational system favours rote learning. Students are encouraged to cram and reproduce even if they lack understanding of the subject matter. Some of them see no moral difference between this practice and cheating.

The cheating ‘norm’ speaks of a culture of dishonesty. It is sometimes defended with the argument that while everyone else cheats, children not allowed to do so would be at a disadvantage. At best, this is a defeatist argument

There is much in the education system that needs to change. From uninteresting textbooks to obsolete instructional methodologies and un-trained or poorly trained teachers to poor school management, there is much that can be argued to be a factor in cheating.

The education boards, which have the mandate to design and conduct examinations, too, are not free of blame with regarding to rampant cheating. There have been allegations of entire examination centres and invigilating positions being sold by dishonest board staff. Vigilance teams have been accused of being in cahoots with cheating students and their corrupt facilitators. Decreasing the number of examination centres and making them more transparent may be a partial solution to the problem. Technologies like wireless jammers and CCTV cameras might help discourage some the people who are currently tempted to cheat on account of the flimsy safeguards.

There is an argument that poor facilities at schools and colleges, particularly lack of laboratories is a significant factor. Students who have had the advantage of learning using audio-visual aids and been involved in lab experiments are less likely to see the need to cheat.

It has also been suggested that boards should consider changing the pattern of their examinations to make them more interesting. Currently, it is complained, routine questions ask for boring and lengthy answers which children find unpalatable. Modern examination techniques, it is said, can change this as well as make cheating virtually impossible.

The ways people cheat in the examinations have also been evolving in the recent years. Photo copiers and ‘expert’ teachers were considered the main providers of cheating material only a few years ago. These days it is smart phones and internet. On another level, this has brought some of the parents around to being a part of the racket by looking for the material children need to write and providing it. Irrespective of the honest effort students put in, they can do well at the exams. This should worry the examiners.

Increasingly, law enforcement agencies are being deployed at examination centres to stop cheatings. The deployment is mostly an eyewash. How can a few constables standing outside a examination centre control what goes on inside? The scale of deployment has to change altogether for the exercise to be meaningful. The poor impression police have made in this regard has resulted in calls for deployment of the military.

The cheating ‘norm’ speaks of a culture of dishonesty. It is sometimes defended with the argument that while everyone else cheats, those not allowed to do so will be at an ‘unfair’ disadvantage. This is at best a defeatist argument.

The instances of vigilance teams catching invigilators and students red-handed are too familiar a sight for comfort. And yet once the examinations are over the menace seems to have been forgotten. Cheating cannot be eradicated unless there is a concerted and consistent effort.

It is time for all stakeholders in the educational system to join hands to put an end to cheating which threatens to undermine all their efforts by making a mockery of evaluation.

The writer, a freelance columnist