WHO WILL CHEAT THE CHEATERS?

In an industry like TESOL, particularly for expatriate teachers, one cannot survive without realising that many things are driven by local culture. No matter how dedicated, driven and diligent you are, no matter how much you care about educating your students and opening worlds for them, sometimes the local way of doing things simply overrides the foreigner’s judgement. Judging whether this is good or bad only leads to sleepless nights and white hair that I would rather devote to more worthy causes, like my students’ actual learning. At least, in theory.

The local way usually wins out, certainly wherever I have taught. In Oman it may involve more student collaboration than independent work, more guiding questions to ensure accurate reading of content, and of course the fact that people are always more important than facts, rules or information. This I have come to accept, and in some cases even adopt.

However, I am unwilling to accept the fact that when students cheat on exams, there are no consequences. This is absolutely unimaginable, particularly in a place where the great current drive is for “Quality Assurance” and accreditation. Apparently there is no understanding of the fact that accreditation will not be granted to institutions that do not control cheating.

During an invigilation yesterday I found a second year student copying from copious notes written on his left hand onto his exam paper. I alerted my co-invigilator to this, and we intercepted him. He immediately started wiping his hand clean, and moved it away when I tried to take a photograph with my phone, which was at the ready. Since there is no legal protection for teachers who intercept cheating, we had to allow him to finish his exam. When he finished, I confronted him, and he continued to deny everything, swearing profusely by God as is customary here.

When I returned the exam papers to the local course coordinator, he had already been to see her. She refused to even hear about the incident, and the cheater will go unpunished. This attitude makes me suspect that the majority of cheaters, in fact, even go uncaught, since local invigilators accept this practice. After all, that was how many of them got through college.

Although I will report this to the Quality Assurance committee, the local way is likely to win out once again. This hurts me more than I can even put into words. It is barely any consolation that accreditation will not be granted to an establishment where such incidents take place. It is also not much comfort that, ultimately, the nation is making decisions about the future of their own country in these seemingly insignificant actions. It appears that they really don’t understand the importance of academic integrity.

And much as I try to reason with myself that maybe honesty is a perverse form of cultural imperialism, I simply can’t swallow that one.