ABSTRACT
The concern for quality and goal oriented education in Nigeria, necessitated this study. This is because a nation is driven by the quality of education provided for her citizens. However education in Nigeria today can truly be said to be bedeviled by numerous problems, one of which is examination malpractice. This paper discusses issues in examination malpractice, pointing out the causes of its consequences. It is recommends various ways of controlling the scourge.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
It is true that no nation can rise above the quality of education provided for her citizens. And since the advent of western education in Nigeria, examination has being the major instrument used for the evaluation of learners (or student’s achievement). It is a means of assessing the quality and quantity or performance that an individual has accumulated at the end of a teaching process which may spread over a period of seventeen weeks. Furthermore, education has been adopted as an instrument for national development. Therefore, government, communities, private organization and individuals have established educational institutions with a view to training the citizens for the development of the nation’s physical and human resources. In these institutions, teaching and guidance activities are supposed to take place so that appropriate skills and knowledge can be acquired by the students.
However, machinery through which the extent of knowledge and skill acquisition is determined at each stage of education has been set up. This is in form of examination which would be organized in order to evaluate, assess and test knowledge and skills. The outcome of the examination is used as a basis for decision making on the examinee’s ability. The examinee is consequently awarded a certificate which could qualify him for admission into a school, promotion into higher level of an institution and employment opportunities. Moreover, many decisions which emanate from examination may not be valid due to involvement of examinees in malpractices. When such decisions are upheld, the certificate awarding institutions would be promoting and graduating incompetent personnel who would not be able to contribute positively to national development. Examination malpractice occurs in both internal and external assessment of educational outcome. It is a problem which has been afflicting the educational system for many years. It seems to have defiled solutions, so all antidotes applied so far have been faulted by fraudsters. Infact, it constitutes the most serious problem facing Nigeria educational system in general and secondary education in particular (Adesina, 2005). Therefore, there is a need to sanitize the nation’s education by getting rid of examination malpractices. This is a challenge to the administrators of education within and outside the school system. In this paper, quality assurance is examined as a practical solution to examination malpractice.
