University exams increase cheating

Bristol University have issued a statement stating that a lot more students are cheating in the exams this year.

While their exams have been done on line there is still the requirement of no looking up answers. Ed. What do universities think was going to happen?

While to add to the problems, the university also claimed that essay mills were becoming much more common. Where students pay a third party to write their essay.

In leaked documents, the university says that “online assessment has exacerbated collusion and breaches in academic integrity”, with plans in place to substitute exams with coursework, and use proctoring (supervision) in “a small number of cases”.

In a statement the university did not provide concrete examples. However, what they did say that more cases have been detected this year, for which the exam candidates have been sanctioned.

Exams will be fully online in January and Summer 2022, with in-person exams “only where these are essential for discipline-specific reasons or for external accreditation or to assess practical or performance skills.”

The aim is to reduce the need to memorise information, and move towards assessments that mean students have to apply the knowledge that they have learned.