Exam cheating has clearly moved beyond the days of old school paper notes.
A tutor in Singapore has confessed to helping six students to cheat by supplying answers using mobile phone and blue tooth technology.
Tan Jia Yan pleaded guilty to 27 counts of cheating and 26 charges for conspiring with three other individuals to cheat the Singapore Examinations and Assessment Board (SEAB).
Tan helped the students smuggle concealed mobile phones and Bluetooth devices into exam halls. Her complicated arrangement involved sitting in an exam room (as a private candidate), sending a live feed of the exam papers to outside accomplices using Facetime, and having her accomplices supply answers to students through skin-coloured earphones.
Tan and her accomplices – another tutor and the education centre’s principal – were discovered when an invigilator spotted one of the students behaving suspiciously inside the exam hall. She reported to her superiors that she heard “sounds” coming from the student.
According to the Straits Times, the student was allowed to finish the paper but was later escorted to the invigilator’s holding room where he was asked to remove his vest. He confessed to the crime and implicated Tan and the others.
The court heard that another individual was an accomplice in the scam – he was the director of the company that had referred the students to the education centre.
Both parties had signed contracts ensuring the centre’s principal would receive $8,000 in deposit and $1,000 in admin fees. However, the amount was to be fully refunded if the students failed their exams.
The court case is still ongoing. A trial involving Tan’s three accomplices will begin next week.