Background and Rationale of the Study 1. 1 Background Cheating on exams has become a popular phenomenon all over the world regardless of the levels of development. For instance, Baerthlein (2008), from Germany, described that over the past decade, cheating has become more and more common as an act of academic dishonesty. Referring to the latest statistics she expressed her concern on the alarming rate as more than two thirds of high school students admitted cheating on an exam last year. The same trend was documented in Belarusia, Venezuela, Thailand and Colombia.
Cheating is not done only by academically poor students. According to Baerthlein (2008) even more appalling often the best students cheat to get to the top of their class and they don’t think it is wrong. “Students say cheating is not a big deal; everybody is doing it”, she said. Of course it is a big deal! Cheating is basically wrong and must be punished. If students easily get away with it, they might be encouraged to do it again. They won’t realize that this, in the broadest sense, is an attack on our society, which is based on values like honesty and fairness.
The present epidemic of cheating indicates a loss of those values and cannot be tolerated. It is a serious problem of schools almost at all levels. Likewise, it is also the common practice observed in Addis Ababa university commerce collage. We practically observe that the trend of cheating on exams seems rising from time to time. There was almost no time where invigilators didn’t get into conflict with students during exams. A series invigilator taking watchful action may minimize the degree of the climax. However, cheating seems inevitable even under such a condition.
The academic dishonesty of cheating is not unanimously being condemned, like that of conducting corruption, within in the students and the society as well. Cheating is carried out through voluntary agreements of actors in taking risks of loosing grades if caught. The one who gave answers consider his/her plagiarizing act as a simple support. Hence the current situation entertains cheating like one of the tool to get success. Botero (2008) form Colombia revealed the fact that perhaps once in a life time each one of us has lived this kind of situation and has cheated without looking at the onsequences of this act. Botero (2008) added that everybody should be taught not to cheat from the school days because the problem is that most of the time it is not a matter of once in a life time. If you are successful the first time, the most probable thing is that you will repeat the act; and if you are doing this very often, it could bring serious consequences in both the short and the long term. In the short term, maybe you won’t be caught, and you will get good grades without studying, which sounds fantastic, but you are wasting your time and your money trying to “learn” by cheating.
It is not such a good method. With the rising trend, the types of cheating are advancing. Sandy and Peters (1997-2008) documented that some students use all kinds of cheating techniques, from copying answers from another student to using sophisticated technology. We observe the same reality also in Adama University. The types of teaching that prevails here include: Taking short notes into the examination rooms, copying from students, Whispering with their friends or working collaboratively, Writing on their body parts, desk, and walls, Putting formulas at the back of calculators and using cell phone (SMS).
However, it is known that all types of exams are not equally susceptible to cheating. Workout and open ended questions are less exposed for the problem. But other types of exam like choose, matching, and true and false are easier to see or transfer from/for the nearby friends. With regard to the penalty for cheaters, the senate legislation of the University precisely express the measure ought to be taken for both mid and final exams separately.
In the event that department academic committee finds clear case of cheating, it shall be recommended to the instructor of the course that the student obtain: a) Zero points for the exam or work and publicizing the case when cheating is in mid exam. b) “F” for the course if cheating is on final exam and such other disciplinary measure including suspension for at least one semester to the vice dean (p 113). Instructors took severe action for getting flagrant cheating based on universities regulation. Nonetheless the legislation is not being implemented yet to the extent of the problem in practice.
Thus, school regulation could not console students from cheating. 1. 2 Rationale of the study Cheating on exams has significant impact on quality of education. To maintain the intended objectives of Addis Ababa University commerce collage; conducting systematized controlling and behavioral changing measures are important. Thus this study helps: Produce qualified and confident labor force for the market. Enhance sense of competition among students. Build self confidence of individual while seating for exams. Play respective role for keeping quality of education. Support the objectives of building and setting up Adama University.
Call up concerned bodies contribute collaborative effort. Propose remedial solutions that could bring significant effect. 1. 3 Statement of the problems Cheating on exams became a serious problem at present. The severe state of its condition demands institutional endeavor at least to minimize the range. The problem springs out from the researchers past observation in the field. The university set a great deal of rules and regulations to ensure strict examination practice that didn’t bring remarkable effect so far. Currently Addis Ababa University commerce collage is emphasizing excellence of education across the schools.
However, it is debatable to produce quality labors without controlling the significance of cheating. So, this paper, therefore, will investigate the causes and the nature of cheating on exams and give possible solutions for concerned bodies to apply or make further justification. The following questions are forwarded to uncover its cause. Why students conduct the act of cheating? How instructors react toward cheating? Is cheating on increasing or decreasing? Why cheating supported by friends? 1. 4 Objectives of the study General objective The general objective of this study is to investigate the causes and the ature of cheating on exams in Addis Ababa University collage of commerce with a special emphasis on the Scholl of commerce. Specific objectives ?To identify the cause of cheating on exams ?To measure the extent of cheating ?To see the trends of cheating ?To see the position of instructors in controlling this Academic dishonesty ? To see the position of students in controlling this Academic dishonesty ? To assess some remedial measures needed to be taken to reduce the act of cheating. ?Give awareness about the immoral academic dishonesty of cheating. 1. 5 Significance of the study
The outcome of this paper will provide useful information regarding the act of cheating. It will provide information about the cause of cheating and some remedial measures to be taken to reduce cheating. Since the paper arises various issues related to cheating, it can be helpful for Scholl of commerce to settle mechanisms to solve the problem and to develop qualified self confident and capable enough students to solve socio-economic problems of the society and it can also be supportive for further study in the area by policy makers and higher education institution. 1. 6 Scope of the study
The coverage of this paper is the school of commerce. It encompasses regular program students in all the departments and/or units across the whole batches in this school. The study is also limited to the current academic. 1. 7 Limitations of the study While the researchers conduct each activities of the research, we may face some limitations that could have an impact in achieving the intended objectives. The major limitation of this study lies in the practical inability to take the actual record of the data regarding the trend of cheating which could have given us the accurate measures.
Secondly, in relation to the time limit, the size of our data has turned out to be insufficient to derive a more dependable generalization. Thirdly, it would have been very interesting and convincing if we had used the actual cheaters as our sampling unit to analyze cause and effect relationships. But the current system and the nature of the problem did not allow us to do so. Finally, related to the nature of the data, we failed to use a more rigorous analytical tool that would have helped us see the contribution of each variable to the problem. CHAPTER TWO RESEARCH DESIGN 2. Research Type This Applied research aimed at solving specific problems, i. e. assessing cheating problems in Addis Ababa University Commerce Collage and recommending appropriate remedies. 2. 2 Source of data For this action research, we used primary data’s which is collected from students and instructors as well as secondary data such as reference materials and internet. For our purpose we focused on School of Commerce among other major schools in Addis Ababa University. When we see the current frame work of Addis Ababa University School of commerce, organized in to departments.
As department, Development Economics, Business administration, Accounting, Logistic and supply chain management, Administrative service management and technology system and Marketing. For this research we used data from sampling units described from abide. 2. 3 Sampling technique For our purpose we used different sampling techniques. The major sampling technique we used were, quota sampling for the purpose of selecting students from school of business administration management and trade and instructors. The quota was subdivided in to units and categories i. . first year and third year to improve biased. We exclude 2nd year students because we can get enough information from fresh (1st) and senor students ( 3rd) about problems of cheating. The other sampling technique was systematic random sampling technique which was used to select samples from students of school of business administration management and trade based on the list of student in each year, I. e. from both 3rd and 1st year students. 2. 4 Sampling size From the sample of students in the School of Commerce, we took a total of 112 tudents as our respondents. This sample was distributed to all the departments or units on the basis of fixed quota. These quotas were further distributed over the consecutive year students in each department and/or units. The detail of the sample size is presented as follows (Table 2. 1). Table 2. 1 sample size S. No. Department and/or units Year of educationTotal sample 1st year3rd year 1Accounting 88 16 2 Development Economics 8816 3Business Administration 8816 4Marketing8816 5Logistic and supply chain Management 8816 8AMTS total8 488 4816 96 2. 5 Tools of data collection We used different instruments of data collection. Among the data collection methods, the major one which is utilized by me for this research is questioners, interviews and observations. Two types of questioners were prepared for selected students, i. e. open-ended and close –ended questions. In order to check or be sure the extent of responses close to reality, i used group discussion with selected representatives of the departments or unit in school and each year.
The group discussion were arranged based on equal opportunity of both female and male students or based on sex, this is done to avoid biased with gander. In addition to questioner, used other methods of data collection, interviews and observation. Interviews activated by our group member with selected students and school officials. The third method is observation. In this method, we observed practically problems of cheating during invigilation of exam and identified different ways of cheating. 2. 6 Procedures of data collection
The first task of the research was preparation of questioners, interviews and important issues related to problems of cheating for group discussion. Then I discussed with our friends on the quality of questioners, interviews and discussion points such as the way i distribute questioners, interviewee, and the way raising points during group discussion and necessary improvement could be done before hand. Then I performed tasks with given time, collecting data through questioners, gathering of data through interview, activated group discussion with selected students in different department and different year.
Finally, I brought together all point which is collected through different data collection methods for final preparation of this action research. 2. 7 Data analysis In this part, it is necessary to edit and tally the questionnaires in a way that they can easily be tabulated. After tabulating the responses, descriptive outputs were computed aided by descriptive statistical analysis. The qualitative data from the focus group discussion were categorized into their logical descriptions along with ideas collected open ended questions..
Finally, it is important to describe that that the overall analysis of this paper was made on 106 observations out of the total 112 questionnaires distributed and the qualitative data collected using the other three techniques. Six questionnaires were excluded as two had not been returned and four were discarded for we found them to be defective. Nevertheless, one can see how much the data collection procedure had been successful. CHAPTER 3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 3. 1 Introduction In the process of teaching and learning assessing the performance of students is one of the major tasks of teachers.
Among the various methods of assessment examination is the dominant one especially in the Ethiopian context. It is customary to give students midterm and final exams in the higher institution. Addis Ababa University is among this institution where continuous assessment is rarely implemented and students are evaluated dominantly throughout mid and final examinations. These conditions entail a number of problems that hinder the achievement of the desired objectives One of such problem is prevalence of cheating on exams by students.
The degree of this problem may vary from university to university depending on the institution capacities. Within a university itself, it may vary from one school to other school or even from one department to other. Based on this fact, let us directly go to the specific situation in Addis Ababa university school of Commerce. 3. 2 Perception and diagnosis of cheating As a matter of fact, perception is a subjective measure of a phenomenon that may not indicate the actual magnitude of the event . however it is being used widely at national, firm, individual and international levels.
For instance we can mention the perception survey conducted by a business firm towards the performance of its product, the perception survey done by a government towards the attitude of citizens against the political system, and the perception survey regularly conducted by transparency international on the prevalence of corruption throughout the world. Therefore, we can definitely use these measures for our purpose before coming to the case of cheating on exams; let’s see the perception of students regarding the preparations students make by studding ahead of examinations. 3. 2. 1 Preparation for exams
It is not expected that all students study equally to sit for exam. There are extremely hardworking students on the one hand and there are extremely lazy students on the other. Regarding this, as can be seen in the following table (table 3. 1), about 51 percent of our respondents argue that all students study hard while the remaining proportion (49%) disagree with this idea. Of course we do not see any significant difference between the two arguments. Table 3. 1 perceptions on whether students are equally prepared for exam. Student study hard frequencypercent YES5750. 89 NO5549. 11 TOTAL112100. 0 Source own curvy, 2009 For those who argue that only part of students study hard, we posed further question to check whether there are students who are ready to take advantage of cheating. As can be seen in the following table, there is a good evidence with regard to the existence of students who depend on other students for their survival as the majority of our respondents (about 33%) underline the expectation to cheat as the major reason for not studding hard. for 15 respondents (27%) all the reasons listed in table 3. 2 play the same role in making students not to study hard. he other important and rather striking reason goes to students –teacher relation. The figure in the table sheds some light in this regard as 11(20%) respondents believe in the prevalence of teachers bias toward students with whom they have relation. The remaining respondents attribute the reason for not studying hard to students reluctance or to the believe students have in moderate study or both. Table 3. 2 reason for not studying hard ReasonFrequencyPercentage Reluctance35. 45 Moderate study23. 64 Cheating dependent1832. 73 Teacher relation dependent1120. 00 All1527. 27 Reluctance and moderate6l10. 1 Total55100 Source: own survey, 2009 3. 2. 2 Actual witness on cheating In our effort to find out whether students and teachers have ever seen students cheating on exams, we have got the actual witness. The responses obtained via questionnaire and focus group discussion exposed this reality. Out of 112 (68%) have ever seen. Their collogue students who have been cheating on exams. The remaining 32 % of our respondents replied that they never have such experience. This indicates that more than 6 sample students in 10 observed while students cheat. The following tables (table 3. 3) display this fact.
Table 3. 3 witness on cheating Eye witness on cheatingfrequencyPercent YES7667. 86 NO3632. 14 Total112100. 00 Source: our survey, 2009. Now for those respondents who have described eye witness on cheating, the question is about the measure they had taken. Table 3. 4 shows that among 76 respondents 50 (about 66%) had taken no measure or they had kept silence 12 (24%) raid they didn’t want their classmates to be punished, 16 (32%) replied as it is not their concern 11,(22%) took as a visual act does not need their intervention and the remaining 14% mentioned all the three reasons together.
Table 3. 4 measure taken by students against students who cheat MeasurefrequencyPercent Kept silence5065. 79 Inform to other student56. 58 Informed to invigilator 1621. 05 Inform to class representative56. 58 Total76100. 00 Source: own survey, 2009 Some of the students (16) responded to have reported their observation on cheating to instructors after the examinations. This is a better measure as compared to kept silence to support struggle against cheating, if not the best. About 13 percent of the witnesses said they had reported either to other classmates or to the class representatives.
All this kind of information must have been done at the end of examination. Generally, we can say that students ruled out the need for discharging their responsibility in avoiding cheating. On the other hand, when asked whether they have never been worried about the impact of cheating 94 students (about 84%) responded Yes while only 16percent said No. If this is the case, they should have taken the best measure they could in their part. As the diagnosis of cheating, as perceived by students, indicate we can see two events going side by side in paradox. One is the prevalence of cheating about which the tudents are not only aware but also feel unhappy with it and lack of efforts made by students to fight against cheating despite their worries about it. 3. 3 Why do students cheat? Intuitively, one can raise many reasons for which students cheat. The major ones relate to the students’ academic back ground, personal behavior of students towards learning, ineffective way of teaching and learning process and so on. From our survey findings several reasons were dominantly raised both in focuses group decisions and in the responses to the questionnaires. The questionnaires have come up with the following possible reasons (table 3. ) Table 3. 5 possible reasons for cheating. S . noReasonsFrequencypercentage 1Students do not want to study76. 25 2Week academic back ground3026. 79 3Difficulty of exam2118. 75 4Last resort for survival1311. 61 5All the above2724. 11 6Reason #1 and #21210. 71 7Other21. 79 Total112100 Source: own survey, 2009 Although, all the reasons listed in the table make the major reasons for which the students may cheat ,as it was also suggested by about 24percent of our sample students ,their should be one reason that dominates all the other according to our survey.
Weak academic back ground takes the line share (about 27%) as perceived by respondents. following this ,21 respondents (19%) indicated that students cheat as a result of difficulty of exams or the course in general. But one can logically argue that these two reasons can be looked at from the same angle. Because, despite the difficulty of exams ,students with better academic back ground try their own best without tilting to copy from others. Besides, when we say exam are difficult; it is not an absolute term. What is difficult for one student may be easier for the other.
In the same token about 11 percent(12) of our target respondents have preferred the joint effort of the poor academic performance and students distaste towards studies as the relevant reasons. In addition to these, focus group discussants mentioned some important points. The prevalence of ineffective teaching and learning process was claimed to have its own contribution towards cheating. They argued that effective teaching has the capacity to rise to the understanding and hence confidence of slow learners who are more prone to cheating.
They also added that, even better students may tend to cheat in some occasions where they have failed to study due to some unforeseen events. This kind of reasons, of course, is exception. 3. 4 Conditions that create conducive environment for cheating All the factors mentioned in the preceding part are more of internal to the examinees. There are some other factors that exacerbate, cheating external to the examinees. These factors can be categorized under deficiencies in administrating and setting of exams. We have tried to elicit relevant information on these issue using questionnaires for both students and teachers.
As can be seen from the table (table 3. 6) students and instructors described different conditions that helped students to cheat. From the students side there is a tendency of aggregating all the factors to have equally influential 37 respondents (33%) where found to be inferior of all the factors. On the other hand, there is a strong consensus among teachers in which 14 respondents (about 67%) claim the inconvenience of exam rooms and administrating of large number of students per class. Table 3. 6 conditions that create conducive environment for cheating Student sampleInstructors sample
S. No. External cause 0f cheatingfrequencyPercentagefrequencypercentage 1Nature of exam1916. 960 2Nature of exam room76. 2514. 76 3Large # of students per class1715. 18419. 05 4Loose invigilation108. 9314. 76 5Lack of punishment1212. 50 6All of the above3733. 0414. 76 7Only 1,2and 387. 141466. 67 total112100. 0021100. 00 Source: own survey, 2009 When we look at the independent impact of the factors, nature of the exams seems to dominate the others factors since about 17 percent of students are in favor of it, followed by large number of students per class room on exam.
The later exclusively dominate the others as about 19 percent of teachers responded against administrating large number of students per class. From this, we can conclude that the major cause for cheating is allowing large number of students to take the exams in a narrow class room. 3. 7 Types of cheating Now a day, controlling cheating has become a bit difficult due to the development of new methods with time. We have tried to find out the common type of cheating by asking both students group and instructors groups. Accordingly, the following results were obtained Table 3. 7 types of cheating S.
NoTypes of cheatingStudents sampleInstructors sample frequencypercentagefrequencypercentage 1Copying from others119. 8214. 76 2Using short notes1513. 39419. 05 3Writing on body parts54. 4614. 76 4Using cellular phone108. 93 51 and 26759. 82 6All43. 571571. 43 Total112100. 0021100. 00 Source: own survey, 2009 The above table reveals that using short notes (informally called ‘aterera’) is the dominant type of cheating as about 13 percent of students and 19 percent of invigilators responded in favor of it. However, 60 percent of students viewed that copying from others and using short notes jointly make the common type of cheating.
In fact there is also a recently growing trend of using cell phone to transmit answers, if examinees are not prohibited to use cell phone on exams as a calculator. Similarly, sharing calculators and using calculator by itself can also be a host for cheating epidemic. The figures in the tables show meaningful evidence on these issues. From the invigilators side 15 (71%) argue that all type of cheating are prevalent. However, as we have mentioned earlier the use of short notes (atereras) dominates in both groups when seen independently. 3. 8 Gender disparity in cheating
Pertaining to the traditional heritage, male and female have not been treated equally in many cases. One of the consequences of such disparity is differences in academic performance between male and female. Accordingly, there is also a difference in probability of cheating on exam. Our data supports this ideas as 76respondentes (68%) described that males and females are not proportionate in cheating. Table 3. 9 gender difference in cheating Gender equality on cheatingFrequencyPercentage YES3632. 14 NO7667. 86 Total112100. 00 Source: own survey, 2009
Now the question is “is cheating more common among female students or male students? ” From our findings 19 respondents (25%) say male are more common in cheating. On the other hand in table 3. 10 57 students responded (75%) the other way round. According to them female are the dominant groups under the cheating topics. The reasons for this situation may require separate investigation to make a dependable argument. Table 3. 10 sex difference on cheating Dominant sex in cheatingFrequencyPercentage Male1925 Female5775 Total76100. 00 Source: own survey, 2009 3. 9 Perceptions on the extent and trend of cheating in SBAMT 3. . 1 The extent of cheating In order to have the image of cheating in the school, we have tried to measure individuals perceptions. We have raised the same questions for students and instructors in the school on which the following information was documented. Table 3. 11extent of cheating Students samplesInstructors samples Extent of cheatingFrequencypercentagefrequencypercentage Very high1311. 61522. 81 High2522. 321047. 62 Moderate4136. 61628. 57 Low1916. 96 Very low1412. 50 Total112100. 0021100. 00 Source: own survey, 2009 As one can see from the table the problem of cheating seems very serious.
Among the sample students 38 (about 34%) perceive the problem to be high or very high. The largest proportion of the respondents perceive the problem to be moderate as 41 (37 %) of them replied so. This implies more than 70 percent of students recognized the prevalence of cheating in the school while less than 30 percent of them denounced the problem. The problem is even more serious if we look at the view of teachers on table 3. 11. As we can see from the table, more than 70 percent of instructors rated the problem to be high or very high while the remaining perceive the problem to be in its average level.
The fact that no instructor rated low and very low level strengthen the need to pay a due consideration on cheating. At this point, it is important to see the difference between the perception of students and teachers that has to be supported by tactical measures. For this purpose , we assigned on ordinal scale for the rating as : very high = 5,high = 4, moderate = 3, low = 2, very low =1. Then the main rate was calculated for each group and the two sample t-test was conducted as follows. Table 3. 12two sample t-test with equal variances Ratings byobservationMeanStd. error Students1123. 036o. 110522 Instructors213. 520. 161484 Combined1333. 1800. 100599 Difference-0. 9160. 265101 t-statistics =-3. 458 degree of freedom =131 pr(/T/>/t/) =0. 0007 Source: own survey, 2009 The two sample t-test has aimed to test whether the min rate of instructor is statically different from the min of students’. The null hypothesis is Ho: difference = 0 while the alternate hypothesis is: Ha difference ? 0 in case of two -tailed test. Specifically the objective was to test whether -0. 916 is significantly different from zero. Accordingly we found that the probability of the difference to be zero is less than one percent (p-value =0. 007). Therefore, we conclude that the perception of cheating by student is significantly different from that of instructors or invigilators. More importantly, from the above analysis we can derive very good indicators of the extent of cheating which can also be used as the bench mark against which future improvement can be gauged. This indicator is called perception index (PI). One can understand explicitly how the index is calculated from the following table. Table 3. 13 ratings and frequency of perception ratingsStudentsTeachers frequencyTotal valuefrequencyTotal value 11414 21938 341123618 251001040 51365525 total1123402183 PI = 0. 607PI = 0. 79 Source own survey, 2009 As it is indicated in the table (table 3. 13), the perception index of students was calculated by dividing the grand total of total values of students ratings by the maximum possible Wight (5×112). For teachers the same procedure was used. By doing so, we can see that the perception index of teachers (0. 79) is higher than that of students (0. 607). This means that instructors perceive the problem of cheating to be higher than what students do. In the extreme case of cheating the index will approach to one.
Now, for our purpose we can take the average value of the perception index (PI) which is equal to 0. 6985 which can be rounded to 0. 7 this is a very interesting indicator for operational purpose. In polices that reduce cheating are implement in the future this index will decrees. Thus, PI is the very important measure of in this action research. 3. 10 Perception of cheating on the trend and departments in SBAMT The question ‘whether cheating has increased or decreased or constant’ was raised only to students which should have been raised for teachers, too.
The research team admits this as a mistake. So, we concentrated only on the results obtained from students. Table 3. 14 the trend of cheating (perception) TrendsfrequencyPerception Decreasing2320. 54 Constant2421. 43 Increasing6558. 04 Total112100. 00 Source own survey, 2009 Table 3. 14 displays the perception of students against the trend of cheating. It is clear from the figure that a substantial number of students 65 (58%) agree that the trend of cheating increasing from time to time. Nearly, equal proportion of students perceives the problem of cheating to be constant and to be decreasing.
This kind of information should have been supported by the actual data on the number of cheating case across the semesters and over years. Owing to the absence of such a system we had no option but to use our usual perception anyhow, the data shows that there is an increasing trend of cheating. We were also interested to examine the department or unit which is more vulnerable to the problem of cheating in SBAMT. This was based on the informal discussion frequently made among students. Our enquiry has come up with the result shown in the following table. Table 3. 15 cheating and departments /units
S. NODepartmentFirst in cheating 2nd in cheating3rd in cheating figurepercentfigurepercentfigurePercent 1Business administration 119. 821210. 712017. 89 2Accounting1210. 71108. 931311. 61 3Economics1513. 3987. 1487. 14 4Marketing4136. 612017. 861210. 71 5Logistic98. 0428251916. 96 6Tourism10. 8943. 5798. 04 7Trade10. 89 8Indeterminate2219. 643026. 792925. 89 Total112100112100112100 Source own survey, 2009 Intuitively, we can think of differences in the degree of cheating among departments depending on the nature of courses which has implication on the type of exam.
Objective types of question are more likely to be susceptible for cheating. Thus, it is necessary to raise this kind of issues in this study for practical purpose. In this regard table 3. 15 shows the perception of students. As we can see from the table 41 respondents (37%) indicated marketing department is more prone to cheating. This may be due to the theoretical nature of the courses in the department, as rated by the 20 students (18%), was business administration. The departments or units found to be relatively less affected by cheating are tourism and trade.
From 20 to 27 percent of students have found rating departments on the basis of cheating to be indeterminate. This is logically acceptable as a student may know what is going on only in his or her department. However, the peace of information we obtained from the above analysis indicated that marketing department has to get priority to take cheating followed by logistic and business Administration respectively. There is another view in this regard from the official of the school. He described to have raised the problem of cheating on the academic committee from time to time.
According to him it is the business administration department that rates first in cheating as they receive a more frequent claim from this department indicating difference in perception of students and the official. 3. 11 Experience of teachers as invigilators and instructor The experiences of invigilators on the types of teaching they frequently observe and their perception, the extent of cheating have already been discussed and the foregoing parts. The remaining issues deemed relevant will be described in this part. Among the instructors who failed our question, about 67% have only one year experience in Adama University.
The remaining 7(37%) have two or more years of experience. But this doesn’t matter much as our concern is mainly on the current academic year. All the instructors believed that they made thee maximum effort they could to avoid cheating on exams when assigned as invigilators. This response is at odds with what we practically observe. For instance, it is common to see invigilators who perform something else such as reading books while they were expected to keep their eyes on the examinees. Despite this fact 18 respondents (86%) claimed that they made all the necessary cautions on exams.
Table 3. 16 precautions made by invigilators S. NoActivitiesfrequencypercentage 1Give words of warning– 2Managing seats14. 76 3Being careful and alert vigilant29. 52 4All1885. 71 Total21100 Source: own survey, 2009 If they face student cheating on exam, the majority of our respondents 12 (57%) described that they take a step by step measures. Particularly, they first warn the students not to show on late trial for cheating and make some seat rearrangement. If this fails to help avoid cheating by the suspected student they said to have put a signature on the exam paper for venality.
From our sample 19% of the invigilators take the extreme measure if the student repeat suspicions movement after the first warning without making any seat arrangement. To other extreme, equal proportion of invigilators directly put them signature at the first stance of students showing sing of cheating. Genera, it is expected that the instructor of the course penalize students on the parts of whom invigilators put a signature. The problem here is whether this is unanimously implemented among all the teachers or not. Besides, this has to do with the awareness of instructors regarding the universities legislation on the issue.
However, it does not sense that all the instructors have this awareness if one is keen at the actual events. From our survey we found that as there is adequate evidence in support of this idea. About one- third of the sample respondents frankly replied to be unaware of the universities Legislation while two- third of them described to have the awareness’s. However, regardless of their awareness, only 71 percent (10respondents) have ever implemented the rules and regulations. When asked further question about penalty the implemented, this group provided the following responses.
Table 3. 17 Penalties made by the instructors S NoPenalty frequencypercent 1Gave “F” on final330 2Gave “0” on mid110 3Deducting some point110 41 and 2550 Total10100 Source: own survey, 2009 As can be seen from the table, 3 instructors (30%) gave “F” for students who cheated on final exam while the largest proportion (50%) of the respondents replied to have given “0” for those who cheated in mid exams, in addition to the former penalty. This implies that about 80% of invigilators who were aware of the legislation implemented the legislated penalties accordingly.
On the other hand, there are invigilators who have never implemented the rules though they are aware. The reason they gave for not implementing the rules includes the practical difficulty of implementation, absence of evidence for cheating and not cheating case faced. For the question that asks the number of “F’s” given for cheating case in he completed academic year, one respondent replied to have given 4 F’s while 7 respondents gave more than 4 F’s. The majority 13 respondents’ didn’t give any F on the case owing to the reasons mentioned above.
Generally, the above explanation rules out the absence of implementing the legislation as one of the causes of increasing in cheating. But, more than 12percent of students responded that lack of penalty for cheaters was a problem. Besides, the same idea was repeatedly raised in the focus group discussion. This shows that there is a knowledge gap between students and teachers regarding the penalty implemented on cheaters. We may suspect two things here: one is the information given by instructors may be exaggerated. Secondly, students may luck information about the penalties cheaters received.
This kind of confusion necessitates the need for keeping the actual records on cheating and explicit communication to the rest of students. CHAPTER 4 CONCLUTION AND RECOMMENDATION 4. 1 CONCLUTION The aim of this action research was to examine the problem of cheating of exams in Adama University specific to the school of Business Administration Management and Trade (SBAMT). In order to attain the objective, we have collected primary data from students in the school using a quota sampling, while availability sampling was utilized to collect data from instructors using pre-structured questionnaires.
This was supplemented also by a focus group discussion in one to six arrangements with students group. By doing so, it was found that the problem of cheating is pervasive in the school. Both students’ and instructors’ group unanimously described that the extent of cheating was more than the average expectation. Of course, it was found that there is a significant difference between the perception of students and that of instructors as tested by difference of two-sample mean test. The perception of instructors is significantly higher than that of students indicating that the problem is credibly serious.
The perception index of student was 0. 607 while that of instructors found to be 0. 79. The average values from this two groups amounted to 0. 70 implying the need for intervention. Besides, students indicated that the trend of cheating was gating higher and higher. The major causes of cheating were the administration of exams in narrow rooms with large number of students and the seating arrangement of the exams rooms. This condition was claimed to create a favorable condition for those students who rely on other clever students partly as they had poor academic performance and partly due to their personal behaviors.
The extent of the problem was also different from one department to the other department in which marketing takes the leading position. Gender issues, female students were found to be the prime cheaters in the schools. Among different types of cheating the popular ones include the school of short notes on exam and copying from colleagues. In preventing the problems of cheating it is clear that as better students are the prime victims they should have contributed their share. However, the result shows no students made any effort in this regard.
It was also found that there were instructors who were either reluctant on their invigilation and/or who failed to penalize students caught cheating, according to the view of students. The over all analysis implies that cheating problems has not get any focuses in the school disregarding the consequences of cheating on the fair computation of students among each other in particular and on the quality of education, in general. It is, of course, unfortunate that it could be difficult to solve some administrative problems like increasing the number of convenient exam under the current capacity.
However, some preventive measure can be exercised as short term solution if all concerned bodies including students, invigilators or instructors, administrative organs and the school official can work together. Based on this ground the following recommendations were forwarded as a solution from the majority of our respondents and the implication of the findings. 4. 2 RECOMMENDATIONS ?A system has to be created that make students cooperate in fighting a cheating. ?The existing class facility has to be utilized in a programmed and optimal manner to avoid over population in exams. It is important to consider the assignment of at least two invigilators per exam rooms if possible. ?Exams consisting objective questions need to be coded. ?There must be a control mechanism on liaises-fair invigilators on exam. ?There should be continues follow-up of the problem of cheating by school officials including the implementations of the school legislation. ?Instructors should be encouraged to make use of effective teaching methodology to up lift slow learners and build their confidence on exam. Students must be strictly prohibited to use there own rough paper while it is also necessary to supply them with rough papers that bear officials seals of the university. ?Invigilators should not allow students self set arrangement to avoid predesigned cheating. ?Instructors must consider the implementation of a continuous assessment to avoid extra reliance on mid and final exams. ?The school should consider a regular discussion on the problem of cheating on exams with instructors to see the pace of the problem and keep a formal record on cheating cases at every department ever semester. Awareness creation among students may also help in making students to take care of the coquinas of cheating. 4. 3 ACTIONS TAKEN To see whether the major recommendations work or not. The researchers have administered a quiz for extension students where by dividing the class (3rd year economics students) in to two, each with 20 students invigilated by two instructors. Any rough paper from their own source sharing calculator and using cell phone were prohibited. Thus, we have found that the condition was totally inconvenient for those students whom we know as cheaters in previous exams.
There fore we can say that the recommendations are easily implemented and effective in minimizing the likelihood of cheating. References Adama University Senate Legislation Baerthlein, D. (2008). Academic dishonesty: Online Magazine: Issue No. 13. Retrieved on 26/07/09 from http//index. html Botero, L. O (2008). Consequences of Cheating: Online Magazine, Issue No. 13. Retrieved on 26/07/09 from http//index. html Sandy and Thomas (1997-2008). Academic Dishonesty (cheating): Online Magazine. Retrieved on 26/07/09 from http//index. html Contents
Acknowledgement ………………………………………………………………………………………. I Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………………………… II CHAPTER ONE1 1. 1 Background1 1. 2 Rationale of the study3 1. 3 Statement of the problems3 1. 4 Objectives of the study4 1. 5 Significance of the study5 1. 6 Scope of the study5 1. 7 Limitations of the study5 CHAPTER TWO6 2. 1 Research Type6 2. 2 Source of data6 2. 3 Sampling technique6 2. 4 Sampling size7 2. 5 Tools of data collection7 2. 6 Procedures of data collection8 2. 7 Data analysis8 CHAPTER 310 3. 1 Introduction10 3. 2 Perception and diagnosis of cheating10 . 2. 1 Preparation for exams11 3. 2. 2 Actual witness on cheating12 3. 3 Why do students cheat? 14 3. 4 Conditions that create conducive environment for cheating16 3. 7 Types of cheating18 3. 8 Gender disparity in cheating19 3. 9 Perceptions on the extent and trend of cheating in SBAMT20 3. 9. 1 The extent of cheating20 3. 10 Perception of cheating on the trend and departments in SBAMT23 3. 11 Experience of teachers as invigilators and instructor25 CHAPTER 429 4. 1 conclution29 4. 2 recommendations31 4. 3 actions taken32 References33
