The experience of remote exams, during the “Corona” pandemic, raised questions and controversy on social media among parents about the penalty for parents helping their children solve exam questions, or for students themselves to seek help from textbooks and educational resources.
The Ministry of Education confirmed that it is implementing a package of supervisory measures to detect cheating, explaining that the goal of education is to develop students’ skills, not grades. Meanwhile, the legal advisor, Dr. Youssef Al-Sharif, revealed that no law has been issued criminalizing this type of cheating, but there are regulations prohibiting it, and penalties are applied that do not amount to Up to the point of criminal punishment, which ranges from warning the student, canceling the exam, and depriving him of the subject.
In detail, parents of students disagreed on social networking sites about the concept of cheating and its punishment, as a group of them considered that applying exams remotely automatically allowed the student to seek help from scientific sources such as books or the Internet and adopt a methodology for searching for information, in addition to some of them doing so for fear of failing the exam. While another group confirmed that the student’s obtaining assistance, whether from his family or from any other sources, is considered an act of fraud, and equates the outstanding student with others, and it also harms the student himself. And his future, and a penalty must be applied to this type of fraud.
Parents of students in different academic stages confirmed that they were unable to leave their children to take the exams alone, due to their fear of any error occurring on the computer or the Internet during the exams, in addition to the additional fear of taking exams remotely due to the “Corona” pandemic, noting that their presence next to their children While taking exams, its purpose is to support and help them clarify what is difficult for them to understand, especially because there is no teacher to help them clarify the meaning of some questions, as was the case in exams inside school.
The families of the students, Magda Fawzi, Mervat Samir, Walaa Shafee, Ahmed Musa, and Khaled Ramzi, told Emirates Today that parents bear the greatest burden in the educational process since the implementation of distance education, and they are forced to help their children with the tests because they know well that they have not benefited. During the school year to the extent that allows them to take the exam on their own, especially given the lack of confidence of parents in equal opportunities among students, and the lack of certainty that the students’ families will be present with their children during the exam. He encourages the rest of the students’ families to help their children.
For its part, private schools in Abu Dhabi called on students’ families not to worry about exams, and to let the students take them themselves to raise their confidence in their abilities, especially since it will not affect their transition to higher grades, while the Department of Education and Knowledge called on students’ families to allow their children to take tests and exams without interference. Among them, she pointed out her understanding of the desire of students’ families to empower their children, and warned that excessive dependence on parents limits children’s motivation and can affect their abilities and educational level.
The schools confirmed that they were equipped with tools to prevent cheating, and adopted online proctored tests for students, while specifying time periods for electronic tests, to encourage students to perform them on their own, especially since the tests will not affect achievement and progress at the end of the year, noting that they have formed technical teams of specialists in the field. Electronic monitoring to monitor exams that are conducted “remotely”, to solve any technical problem that may occur during exams.
Teachers and administrators in private schools, Ola Samir, Amani Rayhan, Maryam Khalaf, and Ahmed Gad, reported that many of the students’ families help their children during exams, which affects determining their true level, and makes it difficult for schools to develop academic plans for them during the next academic year, pointing out Families want their children to achieve outstanding results, not realizing that these results will harm them in the future and will not benefit them.
The teachers stressed that schools play their role in educating students’ families about the dangers of cheating on the students’ future and upbringing, but they do not have the authority to prevent students’ families from helping their children, pointing out that in kindergarten and first grades, tests are sent to students for training before taking them. This is to increase their self-confidence and educate them that tests do not determine the fate of the learner, but rather their goal is to measure the skills and knowledge that the student has acquired, and to help teachers enhance their aspects of understanding and awareness in the future.
While teachers, Muhammad Siddiq, Iman Jad, and Layan Thabet, stated that schools have developed a mechanism to control tests remotely by turning on the cameras on students’ devices, or turning on the feature of monitoring students’ browsing programs during the exam to prevent them from using other pages or sites to answer the questions asked, In addition to inviting students to open another device so that the teacher can be in contact with the student during the test, where the first computer is connected to the test taking site and the other device is connected to the “Zoom” program to allow the teacher the opportunity to follow up on the student and ensure that it is him. Who takes the test?
They added that the emergence of the Corona pandemic and the resulting procedures for transitioning to distance education to ensure the safety of students did not provide schools with the opportunity to set regulations for electronic cheating. Therefore, each school applies indicative procedures aimed at the benefit of students, but they do not amount to punishment or deprivation from exams, especially taking into account Taking into account the circumstances of the pandemic, they pointed out that many students’ parents take advantage of turning off the sound feature in the “Zoom” program to help their children, as they can guide them to the correct answer, without appearing in the camera frame.
For his part, the legal advisor, Dr. Youssef Al-Sharif, said that during the recent period, many students’ families raised controversy on social media about criminalizing and punishing cheating in exams and punishing it with imprisonment of up to 10 years, and what was said in the meantime that it represents fraud crimes. Impersonation, etc.
He continued that cheating is a reprehensible creation before it is an act, and this act is absolutely without restriction or certainty as to whether it is sinful or not, because morality differs in the balance of the law from it in religion or custom. There are some morals that are reprehensible, whether in terms of religion or custom, but they are not sinful or It is punishable by law. Among the reprehensible morals are those that affect religion itself and are punishable by religion but not punishable by law. There is no doubt that abandoning prayer is punishable by religion, but it is not considered a punishable crime in law. the law.
Al-Sharif added that morality does not coincide in truth and reality sometimes with the law, so it was necessary to root the act as we mentioned before in order to determine the extent of its criminal offense as raised or not, and the scope of the penalty or punishment for it.
He pointed out that the constitutional rule is that there is no crime or punishment without a text (Article 27 of the State Constitution), and the legal principle is that the specific restricts the general, and that the absolute remains absolute unless it is restricted (the principle of the absolute and the restricted, which is a legitimate and legal matter as well), and criminalization or recrimination and punishment. Its source is legislation, not morals, custom, personal opinions, or anything else.
Al-Sharif explained that legislation progresses from the top to the bottom, that is, from the constitution, then the law, followed by decrees, regulations and decisions. Legislation must coexist with all its branches of society and be subject to the laws of change, development and modernization. Therefore, texts and even laws and what is below them are amended or changed from time to time to keep pace with this modernity.
He stated that the field of education is a special field subject to special laws and regulations, and there are rules that confront cheating in exams and determine the penalties resulting from it, stressing that the punishment for cheating is penalties, not punishments. Education regulations at all levels prohibit cheating in exams and impose penalties on it that range from warning the student, canceling the exam, and depriving him of the exam. A subject or a number of subjects, or being deprived of taking an exam for a year or more, etc., all of which are penalties that do not amount to criminal penalties.
Al-Sharif pointed out that fraud incidents are subject to their own rules and regulations as long as they are not covered by the law and as long as a special law is not issued criminalizing them.
He stated that we must differentiate the incident of cheating in the traditional education system from the modern education system. There is no doubt that the traditional education system relied on the student’s memory and his ability to memorize, while in the modern education system the concept of examination and evaluation in general changed, so the purpose of examinations became Evaluation is a measure of the student’s level of comprehension, achievement, familiarity, and understanding, not memorization. Therefore, it has become possible for exams to bring books and references, which is known as the “open book exam” system, and likewise to use electronic books or references, or People, whether a teacher or someone else.
He continued that the concept of cheating must be understood within the scope and system of the exam and the special rules and regulations determined by the relevant authority responsible for the exam, such as the Ministry of Education for the stages of basic and secondary education and universities for this stage.
Al-Sharif stated that “there is a difference between cheating in the traditional exam system and what the modern exam system does not know about, as evidenced by allowing remote exams through technical means and modern technology.”
Identify weaknesses
The Department of Education and Knowledge advised private schools to use diagnostic and formative tests to identify areas of weakness in the learning process, noting that the student must be transferred to the next grade according to the global promotion system to ensure that he remains within the academic environment with his peers, in line with the private school policies manual applied in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. The school must address students’ academic delay through the (spiral learning/remedial) method.
Impersonation crimes
The legal advisor, Dr. Youssef Al-Sharif, stated that delving into the issue of cheating in exams by referring to the crimes of impersonation and forgery is outside the context of the topic itself, because exams are a relationship between the body concerned with the exam, such as the Ministry of Education or universities, and the person concerned with the exam, i.e. the student, and the presence of an unidentified person. What is concerned with the examination takes the incident or act that this foreign person will commit from the scope of privacy to publicity, and only here can we talk about those actions and crimes, but as long as the actions or behavior remain within the limits of the privacy of the system with its personalities and scope, We are not in the shadow of generality, but rather we are committed to its privacy, rules and regulations.
He continued that by pointing out that cheating in exams leads to graduating a generation that lacks knowledge and achievement, this is what has been proven in practice to be completely untrue, because the education system’s strategy is to direct the student towards research methodology, not indoctrination with information.
• The spread of cheating in exams raises controversy among students’ families about punishment and responsibility.
• “Education” implements a package of control measures to detect cheating in exams.