Pressure, cheating, and academic integrity: Examining the Class of 2022’s scandal

Every year at this time, prayer groups are formed, private tutors are paid handsomely and Saturday classes are arranged, all in a bid to get Grade 12 pupils to pass their year-end examinations.

According to an ongoing investigation by the department of basic education, it is alleged that the class of 2022 had more than 1 100 matriculants from schools in Mpumalanga, Eastern Cape, North West and Limpopo who decided not to start a prayer group, but rather a WhatsApp group to cheat.

What makes the situation even worse is that several teachers and invigilators were also implicated in the ruse involving answers for the economics, English and mathematics papers being posted in the WhatsApp group. The implicated teachers also supplied pupils with answers while they were on toilet breaks.

It is sad to note that the provinces which performed the poorest in last year’s final examinations – Limpopo, Mpumalanga and the Eastern Cape – also have the most number of pupils embroiled in this scandal.

One would think that after such an unfair advantage, these pupils would be the top performers, but this was not the case.

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Of course, it is easy to judge these delinquents, until all of us realise just how much pressure they are under. I am not saying that what they did was justifiable, but in an effort to prevent this annual occurrence from happening we need to consider all factors.

Start with yourself and consider if your friends and colleagues have ever seen your senior certificate results and what they would think of you if they had?

You might be a successful senior manager, but your final mark for maths was 34%. Plus, you know if you shared this with your partner, they would never trust you with the family grocery budget again.

And what about that embarrassing geography mark you have kept hidden from your children? How do you even start to tell them that the reason you received such low marks for the subject is that your answer to the question: “What is the strongest force on earth?” was “love”?

Let’s hope the class of 2023 blue-ticks anyone who offers them answers in a random WhatsApp group, especially before the exams even start.

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