Exam papers sold on social media

Test papers suspected to be part of the ongoing 2020 Form 4 national exams are on sale online, reinforcing fears of leakages and cheating.

Investigations by the Nation this week revealed that the papers are mainly being circulated and marketed on social media WhatsApp and Telegram groups accessible to students, teachers and parents.

Merchants of the papers ply their trade in the evening and target desperate teachers and candidates seeking leakage for the next day’s tests.

On Tuesday evening, a man who claimed to have the Kiswahili Language paper scheduled for Wednesday morning, offered it for sale in several Telegram groups. He was charging Sh1,000, and it was not immediately clear to the Nation team if any of the hundreds of teachers, parents and candidates in the groups bought the product.

The sellers were asking buyers to pay and expect the papers at 7.30am — suggesting that they could be rogue examiners who open exam papers before the stipulated time, take photos and send them to their clients.

But while Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha yesterday admitted that exam papers are on sale, he dismissed them as “fake” and warned parents and candidates against buying them.

He revealed that a businessman had been arrested for the illicit trade in Kericho.

“We’ve seen an emergence of fake papers being circulated in some areas of this country, purported to be genuine examination materials,” Prof Magoha said during monitoring of the tests at Upper Hill School, Nairobi.

Pass examinations

“Our examination has not been leaked, it will not be leaked, and only genuine revision can help candidates to pass the examinations successfully.” According to the CS, 15 people have so far been arrested for perpetrating exam irregularities, and some of them have been charged in court.

Those in custody include a university student, who was arrested in Busia County for aiding cheating at a private school.

Fifteen mobile phones, Prof Magoha said, had also been confiscated from various examination centres, and they were undergoing forensic analyses to unmask the people behind the cheating.

Eight of the phones were taken from candidates inside exam rooms, revealing the growing use of technology to cheat.

On Tuesday, the CS said cheats had now resorted to early exposure of the materials, which are given to candidates before exam time. He said several schools in Migori, Nyamira and Garissa counties were being investigated for accessing exams before time.

“Unprofessional examination officials managed to expose the examinations a little earlier than the scheduled time once the papers leave safely from the examinations container,” he said.

Lately, impersonation of candidates has been a common trick employed by cheats.

According to Kenya National Examinations Council (Knec) guidelines on exam cheating, any candidate who commits an examination irregularity in any paper will have their results cancelled.

Sh2 million

Such a candidate will be awarded result “Y” as the overall grade.

Any person who accesses the exams before the scheduled time risks up to 10 years in jail or a fine of up to Sh2 million.

If there is evidence of wide-spread irregularities in any examination centre, the examination results for the whole centre will be cancelled.

In the most recent KCSE examinations in 2019, results of 1,309 candidates were cancelled, down from the 4,519 candidates the previous year.

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