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| A student listens to an online lecture at a classroom in Chung-Ang University, March 16, as schools opened for the spring semester online due to COVID-19. Korea Times file |
By Bahk Eun-ji
More universities have considered conducting onsite exams for the second semester amid growing concerns over cheating on online tests, according to school officials, Monday.
While controversy over fairness of online exams is growing as some students argue that tests should be taken in person, others raise concerns over possible infections.
Many universities have faced cheating problems on exams held online during the spring semester amid the coronavirus pandemic. In the first semester, students of universities including Seoul National University, Yonsei University and Korea University were found to have cheated on online mid-term exams usually by making group chat rooms on messenger services such as Kakao Talk or Telegram to share answers.
As several students have been caught cheating, universities said they would sternly punish cheaters, but couldn't stop all cheating in final exams. In June, nearly 700 students of Hankuk University of Foreign Studies were found to have cheated on an online exam by sharing answers in an open group chat.
The school authority discussed punishment at that time, and said it would come up with measures to prevent recurrence by strictly monitoring the test process through webcam. But at the same time, many school officials have no choice but to accept the fact that they have few options to prevent students from cheating during online exams.
"After we observed the series of cheating cases taking place not only at our university but also others, there is no smart way to prevent students from cheating in online tests. We haven't decided yet, but plans to conduct the exam for second semester in a way that students come to school in person," a university official in Seoul who didn't want to be identified.
Earlier this month, Yonsei University said it will carry out onsite exams for the midterms and finals for all subjects in the second semester. In order to prevent the spread of COVID-19 infections on campus, lectures will be mainly conducted online, and only tests will be held in person at classrooms.
Like Yonsei, a growing number of universities are announcing their plans for the onsite exams. Last week, Kyung Hee University also decided to conduct face-to-face mid-term and final exams, and Hanyang University, which carried out its final exams of the first semester in person, is also likely to conduct onsite exams for the second semester.
Students have shown mixed responses to the schools' decisions. Some argue that onsite tests are inappropriate during the pandemic, but others said they are inevitable to protect the fairness of testing.
During a joint meeting of student leaders of departments of Seoul National University on June 5, they said "We hope that the school puts the students' rights to health at the top of their list when making administrative decisions," and requested the school to move the onsite tests online.
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