1/ Few of us relish the idea of exam time, and although some people think our students
are tested too early and too stringently, most have a dim view of cheating.
But it does happen, and students’ attitudes towards cheating may surprise you.
In a survey by US News and World Report, 51% of high school students do not consider it
wrong.
And even more shocking, is the fact that 95% of those students interviewed said that teachers
had not detected their cheating.
2/ Today, we’ve decided we need to dive a little more deeply into this subject and
find out what’s really going on, in this episode of The Infographics Show, Incredible
Ways People Cheat On Exams.
3/ Before we run through the list of creative ways some of these students are getting away
with cheating, let’s first look at some more statistics to see how bad the situation
with cheating on exams really is.
The Josephson Institute Center for Youth Ethics surveyed 43,000 high school students in public
and private schools.
59% of high school students admitted to cheating on a test during the last year, and 34% self-reported
doing it more than two times.
And one out of three high school students admitted that they used the Internet to plagiarize
an assignment.
4/ Cheating isn’t only prevalent in high schools.
Underhanded tactics are also happening in college and graduate schools.
A survey of over 63,700 US undergraduate students and 9,250 graduate students, from the years
2002 to 2005, was conducted by Donald McCabe of Rutgers University, and it revealed more
startling facts.
Here are just a few: 36% of undergraduates and 24% of graduate students admit to “copying
a few sentences from Internet sources without footnoting it”; 14% of students and 7% of
graduate students admitted to “fabricating or falsifying a bibliography”; 7% of students
report self-copying materials “almost word for word from a written source without citation”;
And 7% self report “turning in work done by another.”
So what’s going on?
Let’s take a look at some of the creative ways these students are getting away with
it.
5/ 1.
A manicure can be a very important thing for a young lady if she likes to have neat, tidy
nails.
As it happens, it can also be very useful at exam time.
It is actually possible to apply tiny handwriting or little sticky notes underneath long manicured
nails.
It’s also easy to erase everything using your fingers if you think you’re about to
get caught.
British newspaper The Sun reported in 2017 on a Reddit user post entitled "Nailed the
exam."
The user showed how an unnamed student had carefully written tiny math formulas on minuscule
pieces of paper before sticking them on the underside of her nails.
Creative right?
Maybe yes, but she got little praise with most Reddit users who were quicker to comment
on the student’s laziness, claiming the formulas could have been easily learnt.
One person wrote: "And just think, the amount of time and effort to painstakingly attach
those little bitty cheat-sheets could have gone into actually learning the material."
6/ 2.
Modern pens come in a variety of different shapes and sizes, and some have internal non-transparent
plastic or metal areas that create a perfect environment for secret notes.
You can take the pen cartridge out during the exam and then extract a note with the
necessary information to copy.
And pens in China have gone a step further with the introduction of technology.
In Sichuan province, 40 students were suspected of using a high-tech pen for cheating.
The pen worked like a mini phone and would send test questions back to another location,
and answers would be sent back to the cheaters via in-ear receivers.
7/ 3.
Calculators are one of the most common cheating tools.
If you use a pencil, you can write notes on the back of a calculator and they are almost
invisible unless you look at the calculator very closely, or better still, hold it at
an angle so the light reflects off of it.
And other students have been known to be more cunning by using the calculator memory.
A calculator, after all, is a mini computer, and you can hide formulas and test answers
for some period of time.
With some calculators, you can write a program the day before the exam, and under the program
function, type in formulas or cheat notes that can be accessed during the exams.
But lots of teachers now check the programs on calculators, so students have become more
cunning by putting their notes under the Vars or Variables button in one of the 10 Strings
listed.
When notes are placed in different sections of the calculator, it’s much harder for
the teacher to locate them.
8/ 4.
Since we’re talking about technology, let’s not forget modern digital watches, which can
fully replace smartphones and offer all sorts of cheating options.
They have apps, instant messaging, and Internet access, so when a student is subtle, they
can solve a test in a matter of minutes by using their watch.
And then there are Google Glasses that hook into other devices.
We found a story about students at a medical college in Thailand who were caught using
spy cameras linked to smartwatches to cheat during exams.
They planned to use wireless spy cams embedded in eyeglasses to capture exam questions before
transmitting them to associates elsewhere and receiving responses back through linked
smartwatches.
But the plot was foiled, and Arthit Ourairat, the rector of Rangsit University, posted pictures
of the high-tech cheating equipment on his Facebook page.
9/ 5.
Finally, we also found a rather persuasive cheating method used by some students that
involves psyching the teacher out.
What do we mean by that?
As soon as an exam paper is returned, the student makes corrections that are similar
to the teacher’s corrections and presents them as mistakes made by the teachers.
Some teachers, especially less experienced ones, get nervous because they can’t be
sure they have not overlooked or misinterpreted something.
The teacher may then immediately agree to improve the grade without looking at what
is there and rechecking where the amendments were.
It is not a pleasant method of cheating, and it takes a very cheeky student to use this
underhanded approach.
10/ One country that comes up repeatedly in search results when you look at cheating on
exams is India.
This is due to some past cheating epidemics that have been exposed over the years.
In 2015, British news agency the BBC reported that around 300 people were arrested in the
Indian state of Bihar for blatant cheating on school exams.
Incredibly, dozens of parents and friends of students were photographed climbing school
walls to pass answers through the classroom windows, and some of the classrooms were as
high as four stories above the ground.
Many of those arrested were parents, and at least 750 students were expelled.
11/ State Education Minister PK Shahi asked, "Three to four people helping a single student
would mean that there is a total of six to seven million people helping students cheat.
Is it the responsibility of the government alone to manage such a huge number of people
and to conduct a 100% free and fair examination?"
Then this year the BBC reported again on the situation.
It said that the authorities in the same state in India have now asked students not to wear
shoes or socks in order to stop them from being able to sneak notes with answers into
the exam hall and cheating during exams.
12/ The rule came into effect on February 21 of this year when roughly 1.8 million 15-year-olds
took part in their final class 10 test school exam.
The crackdown on cheating by authorities has seen the state of Bihar's pass rate fall from
more than 70% in 2014 and 2015 to barely 50%.
13/ Cheating certainly seems to be prevalent, but in reality it’s stealing the work of
another student who has put in the time to learn the material.
And getting a good grade you didn’t actually earn can also damage the curve for the entire
class and leave the students who are struggling with exams believing that there is something
wrong with them for not understanding.
14/ So, have you cheated on exams and are there other methods you know of that we didn’t
mention?
Let us know in the comments!
Also be sure to check out our other video, The Most Dangerous Schools In America.
We hope you’ve enjoyed this episode and please don’t forget to like, share and subscribe.
See you next time!