The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Malpractices

  • We introduced CBT to tackle malpractices, says Ojerinde

    THE Registrar, Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), Prof ‘Dibu Ojerinde, has said the examination body introduced the Computer Based Testing (CBT) in the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) to tackle examination malpractices.

    The JAMB boss spoke during a lecture he delivered entitled: Classical Test Theory (CTT) versus Item Response Theory (IRT): An evaluation of the comparability of item analysis results, at the Institute of Education, University of Ibadan (UI), Oyo State.

    Said Ojerinde: “First, I introduced the Computed Based Testing (CBT) because I think we can curb examination malpractices. We need to go the way of the world because everybody is going technological and if Nigeria decided not to join, I’m sorry we will be left behind. So we should do CBT. It is the answer to exam malpractices.”

    Ojerinde said soon, CBT would supplant paper tests.

    “This year, we used 98 vehicles to carry question papers to and from Abuja all parts of the country. Consider the danger, the risk, the life, enough is enough,” he added:

    “The issue of carrying question papers to centres around the country is coming to an end. In three minutes, we could send our questions from Abuja to wherever is going to be. We’re going to do it in UK, Jeddah and anywhere throughout the world. I’ve not seeing any other examination body in Africa that has done what we have done in JAMB on CBT.”

    “Let us now look at the kids who are doing the examination and let us measure their abilities rather than measuring the ability of the test,” he said.

    Ojerinde asserted that estimation of item and person parameters produces more stable and precise values using Item Response Theory (IRT) because it made computer-based testing offer more precise traits estimation using IRT.

     

     

     

     

  • Malpractices inflate exams cost

    Malpractices inflate exams cost

    Examining bodies are forced to spend a lot more conducting public examinations in the name of curbing malpractices, says Registrar of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC), Dr Iyi Uwadiae.

    Addressing journalists after the 54th meeting of the Nigeria Examinations Committee (NEC), the highest decision-making organ of the Council on examination conduct in Nigeria, at the Excellence Hotel, Ogba, Uwadiae said the Council is forced to institute measures to check leakages of question papers, and cheating in the hall, which increases the financial burden of conducting the Senior School Certificate Examinations (SSCE).

    He said: “These measures that we have put in place are capital-intensive. They involve a lot of funds we should have used to do other things. We now spend more money to conduct examinations. Where we ought to send one person, we send five; where we ought to go once in two weeks, we go daily. In our days, WAEC used to drop questions in schools once in two weeks. The principal would just lock up the questions and no student would go there. But it is not so now.”

    However, he said improvement in teaching and learning in schools would reduce the incidence of examination malpractice and urged governments and school authorities to do their parts.

    “ What we should do first is to ensure there is effective teaching and learning taking place in schools,” he said.

    To curb examination malpractice in Nigeria, the WAEC Head of National Office (HNO) for Nigeria, Mr Charles Eguridu, said the Council has invested in some measures including introducing biometric registration, embossing photographs on certificates and some other security measures he could not disclose.

    “We have in the pipeline an amended version of the mobile phone usage during examinations. We are about to roll out new rules concerning biometric registration once the examination board accepts,” he said.

    In her address on behalf of the NEC Chairman Hajiya Fatima Abdulrahman, National President of the All Nigeria Confederation of Principals of Secondary Schools (ANCOPSS), said NEC considered malpractice cases against 101,398 candidates of the 1,695,872 that sat for the May/June 2012 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE).