University students, teachers now leaking exams

Education CS Amina Mohamed with form four KCSE candidates moments before they sat for their biology paper.

University students are involved in examination cheating, the Kenya National Examinations Council (Knec) has said.

“Examinations are now being sneaked and done in special rooms with university students and teachers who are subject experts,” said Knec Chairman George Magoha.

Students in the examination centres planning to cheat are informed ahead of time and encouraged to cooperate.

Prof Magoha also announced three candidates caught with mobile phones would be deregistered.

He did not name the schools, only saying they were located in counties in the western and northeastern regions.

“After the arrests, we left the phones of these candidates on. And after a while, the answers started streaming in,” he said.

He said all the players had been arrested and would face the full force of the law.

Knec listed Garissa, Kisii, West Pokot, Central Region, Coast, Eastern and other parts of the larger Nyanza as examination cheating hotspots.

The arrest of the three brings to seven the number of this year’s candidates to be deregistered. Four candidates were last week deregistered for engaging in malpractices and 20 teachers interdicted.

A university student was last week arrested and charged with sitting a KCSE examination paper in Kisii County.

Davis Ongiri of Maseno University was arrested on Thursday and arraigned before Senior Resident Magistrate Margaret Nafula.

The student was charged with posing as a KCSE candidate registered at St Joseph Nyansakia Mixed Secondary School in Bomachoge.

The magistrate ordered that he be detained until November 19, when he will return to take plea.

Another candidate was arrested in Nairobi with a mobile phone with chemistry examination material. Police said the mobile phone had questions and answers to the English paper three in a WhatsApp group of 70 members.

In Ngong, 19 boys of Oloolaiser High School were arrested last week when they went on the rampage and destroyed school property.