A SURVEY OF EXAMINATION MALPRACTICE AMONG SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background to the Study
Examinations in Nigerian schools dated back to the advent of formal education in the country in the 1800s and it was patterned are the British system. As such, the 1987 ordinance made provision for examinations in schools that have attained the requisite percentage of proficiency (Adesina, 1990; Bandele, 2005). Towards this end, all secondary schools in the country are expected to teach their object is to meet the requirements of examination bodies for the senior secondary school certificate organized by the West African Examinations Council and the National Examinations Commission (FGN, 2004). In Egor Local Government, examinations are either internal or public. Internal examinations set by teachers in the form of class tests and end of term examinations. Public examinations on the other hand, are examinations that are conducted in the public interest by recognized examining bodies that were not, involved in organizing instruction or preparing students for the examinations (Addison, 1990; Slami, 1992; Adeyemi, 1998). Notwithstanding the importance of examinations in the educational system of the state, the instances of malpractices during examinations have been identified (Cromwell, 2000; Aeyegbe, 2002). These malpractices include misrepresentation of identity or impersonation, cheating, the of other students’ work, tampering with the works of others; bringing prepared answers to examination halls, unethical use of academic resources, fabrication of results, and showing disregard to academic regulations (Gross, 2003; Owuamanam, 2005). These vices have been regarded as academic misbehaviour capable of truncating an educational system (Glasner, 2002; Ogunwuyi, 2005). They have also been regarded by researchers (Omotosho, 1992; Hurwitz and Hurwitz, 2004) as dishonesty in examinations perpetrated by a person or a group of persons. Common observations in the local government show that examination malpractices occur in both public and private secondary schools. Although, some researchers argued that examination malpractices occur at a high rate in public schools (Baiyelo, 2004; Daniel 2005), other researchers (Ijaiya, 2000, Igwe, 2004) were of the view that examination malpractices occur at a high rate in private schools.