Academic dishonesty
07. Apr, 2009 
15 Comments
This is an article which I wrote in Le Mauricien a few months ago following the alleged ‘exam paper leakage’ on blackpapers.info:
Academic dishonesty is a form of cheating related to any formal academic exercise. Academic dishonesty can include:
- Plagiarism: reproducing ideas from a source without appropriate acknowledgement or referencing.
- Falsification: ‘cooking’ data to be included in an academic work – e.g. inventing or falsifying the observations of a scientific experiment.
- Deception: giving false information to an authority conducting a formal academic exercise.
- (Conventional) Cheating: obtaining an unfair advantage or aid for a formal academic exercise.
- Sabotage: attempting to prevent others from completing their academic exercise e.g. tearing pages from a reference book in a university library.
(Wikipedia contributor, 2008)
Academic dishonesty should of course be condemned and dealt with very severely when encountered in any form. Unfortunately, some forms of academic dishonesty are pervasive, and even tolerated, in the Mauritian society.
‘Cheating: obtaining an unfair advantage or aid for a formal academic exercise.’
Parents are (rightfully) anxious to provide support for the academic achievement of their offspring. Some are inclined to, for example, lie about their catchment area (deception) or others provide a false electricity bill (falsification). Yet, they expect their children to abide to academic rules and to refrain themselves from cheating at school.
However, the worst abomination remains the existence of private tuitions. Tuitions, as practised in Mauritius, set up an unequal academic playing field. Families of (real) middle and upper middle class maintain their position by having an unfair advantage other poorer families: they can afford to pay private tutors to ensure that their children gain better grades and remain at the top of the social pyramid. (Note that rich families do not even bother about tuitions – they send their children to fee-paying institutions like Le Bocage or Le Lycée …).
This practise has been tolerated by all governments and is well established in our culture. It would be interesting to know how Mauritius will, at the same time boast an equal opportunity law, and maintain an unequal educational system.
Yet, tuitions have a worse academic effect on our students. The spoon-feeding culture prevailing since early childhood prevents the academic interest of the pupil from growing: most Mauritian pupils become exam-minded machines aiming only at good grades. They miss all the joy of academic fulfilment, creativity, scientific curiosity or critical thinking.
Having bred our children into exam-minded robots, deprived of any academic interest, how can we blame some of them to be cunning enough to derive another unfair advantage over their peers? (using the internet, through the mastery of modern communication tools – inaccessible to many poor families) Isn’t this the attitude we have instilled into them throughout their academic life?
Reference:
Wikipedia contributors, “Academic dishonesty,” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Academic_dishonesty&oldid=248715496 (accessed November 16, 2008).
@bruno – check out the bylaws in the student handbook.
where is the article related to penis size? LOL
@shah so you are in Greenwich
… yes I autocensored this post … mo ti gagne ban compleint lor la … enfin …
Ha! Google Cache FTW!
http://209.85.229.132/search?q=cache:GupkoEGdHvoJ:blebon.blogspot.com/2009/04/penis-size-in-mauritius.html+Penis+size+in+Mauritius&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk&client=firefox-a
If only comments had been cached…
u 2 u write in le Mauricien
why u censored the post ?
Btw where is the article you wrote?
Wake up, man!!!!! It’s raining – perfect time to jog! Chop chop.
@Priscus
got 2 articles published there. Deleted due to some complaints and requests.
yes, me too
@shah
ouais to Greenwich 
Cya @ the W Lounge Bar on the 22nd May (End of term party.) We’ll get wasted!
I think the only tuition I was ever serious with was my French tuition, because I sucked so much at it, rather I was lazy. I didn’t take tuition for some subjects and the others were just for “kass pose”. I never remember listening to my physics teacher, though I do remember sleeping a lot. :p
The tuitions system has to be abolished, that’s for sure. But I don’t think you can blame all the parents for what the kids did. I have been brought up in an environment where I was told I only had to focus on my exams, and I don’t think I’d have done this. There was a guy who offered to give me some of the leaked papers during the exams, telling me that it’ll help me get into the laureates group, and that really upset me. I don’t see why I should cheat when I can get where I want with my own abilities.
Morals should be questioned when people cheat. I wonder if they don’t have that on their conscience afterwards.
Long comment -___- Sorry :p
lol ki prof physics ki somnifer comm ca
Congrats for refusing the papers before the exams … yes la trankilite d’esprit pour toute une vie vaut mieux que quelques points.
hey, deleted the penis article?!
come on, i thought we lived in a democracy…
anyway, i agree about the educational system being founded on wrong ideologies.
its like we all get educated for exams and only exams only, and there is more to life than just exams, right.
take scandinavian countries for example; the kids there barely ever do exams, but its a well known fact that these countries enjoy one of the highest standards of living.
the problem does not lie only at primary and secondary level malheureusement…there is a whole to change indeed and it’ll take time, but every country has to start somewhere i guess.
lol…love how the replies in this post are asking about the penis article! :p
You know the penis is more important that some people may realise in cultures where the phallus is considered sacred: http://www.studio925.com/phallus.htm
)
(just thought i’d point this out
…oh and yeh, cheating very bad! :p
I agree with real private tuitions. The ones when there is only one student for a tutor. Unfortunately that kind of private tuition does not exist in Mauritius or it’s not common practice. Anyway, that would have been great.
@keli and nav
bon the article has been deleted … sorry about that I know many people viewed it (52 views in one day according to Google Analytics)
@keli
This tuition plague is maybe the root of some evils in UoM: CSE students learning programs by heart and reciting them in the exams … scary :S
@morinn
Real private tuition is either or Myth or = Rs 1000 per hour
Ene profeuhhh sa :p
My maths and GP tui were real private tuitions =P Maths with only me (had been like that ever since I can remember), and GP me and my friend. Was great. I totally refuse to take tuitions from a teacher who has more that 20 students. That's not called tuitions <_<