Exam cheats should be jailed

Last year, some 114 students of Malava Boys High School were disqualified for alleged cheating in Kenya Certificate of Secondary School Examinations.

Nobody raised a finger against anyone for the debacle. All that the local leaders did was to help them secure places to repeat Form Four.

Attempts to cheat in the examinations by unscrupulous people, continues unabated even in the light of the near bleak future that faced the 114 students of Malava.

Instead of issuing pious exhortation against it, the Ministry of Education and Kenya National Examinations Council (KNEC) should amend the law on education and/or examinations to ban students found cheating, from sitting for examinations for three years.

They should jail those who abetted the cheating for a minimum of 10 years without the option of a fine.

Headteachers found to have abetted the malpractice should be sacked. Cheating in examinations hurts the society’s ability to secure men and women of integrity and competence for its future.

Society gets quacks, morally and intellectually deficient people for its leadership positions. Society is shortchanged. We should not compromise with examination cheats.

The media should not simply report about having come across leaked examination papers. It should also help the Government by handing over strong leads that would help in the arrests and arraignment of these men and women in court.

Let’s not play with the future of intelligent and law-abiding learners who want to earn their grades in a clean manner.

Lets be tough on people who are out to contaminate the integrity of our education.

{Kennedy Buhere, Nairobi}

The alleged leakages being reported show the extent to which our examination system requires an overhaul. It is disheartening to students who genuinely sit the exams to discover that some of their colleagues had prior knowledge of the exam.

KNEC, however, denies the allegations yet this has happened over the years.

What needs to be done is the scrapping of the council and the workers deployed to other departments in the Civil Service so that a new set of people begin working there.

{Okendo Gabriel, Kikuyu}

It is disturbing that cheating in national examinations continues unabated.

The harm this inflicts on us is reason enough for us to ascertain the cause and seek ways of halting this perilous trend. Our society is to blame for this mess.

The culture of employing short -cuts in pursuit of success is not alien to many. Not even the country’s top leadership is an exception. Someone gets elected to public office and within no time, he is flaunting riches that cannot be accounted for.

Rather than take exception to this, our society fetes such people, unconsciously encouraging their juniors to follow suit. Consequently, students see no fault in cheating.

Rewarding honesty and hard work will encourage young people to strive for excellence. Those who short-circuit the process of success should be punished.

{Edwin Mulochi, Nairobi}

 

 

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