Bizarre hitch hits Nairobi university exam

The University of Nairobi had to cancel an examination after students discovered it had major irregularities. The students walked out in protest on Monday, saying the examination had been administered together with the answers and that the questions were below standard.

They also said some of the questions had been set before, adding that the examiner had just recycled old materials. The paper was on HIV/Aids, a common subject studied by all university students. The university also has campuses at Kisumu, Bandari and Mombasa, which were set to administer the test.

On Tuesday, vice-chancellor George Magoha vowed to take disciplinary action against the lecturer responsible. He described the action by the lecturer as unprofessional and unacceptable. “This was sabotage and disciplinary action will be taken against the lecturer to prevent another case like this,” Prof Magoha said.

“An exam should be an exam … it should test what the students have been learning for a certain period,” he added. Lecturers and students at the university who sought anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter told the Nation that the paper was “substandard and even a Standard Eight pupil could tick the choices and score an A”.

Prof Magoha, however, said competent lecturers of the course were not enough, adding that the university was making efforts to address the problem.

Raised questions

The incident raised questions regarding the calibre of lecturers, process of setting and administering examinations, quality assurance and standards. Besides this case, a lucrative examinations brokerage market involving the sale of term papers, and project and thesis writing has emerged around campuses.

Ready-made answers are offered to students with the money to pay. Term papers and projects account for as much as 40 per cent of the entire degree coursework, especially for postgraduate students, which means a high score in this section easily pushes a candidate closer to the pass mark.

This practice is largely associated with Masters of Business Administration parallel degree programmes. These evening classes have more than 200 students per session conducted by a single lecturer. “We are upgrading our quality control system,” Prof Magoha said, adding that his administration is currently installing surveillance cameras to spot cases of malpractice during examination periods.

The vice-chancellor admitted that the university was facing challenges in handling the number of students applying for the evening courses. The university has nearly 46,000 students and 1,500 academic staff. It has a revenue of Sh8 billion per academic year.

The bulk of the money comes from the part-time students, while Sh3.5 billion is injected by the government. The number of part-time and distance learning students have exceeded that of full-time ones, prompting one of the lecturers to write a PhD thesis on the scenario.

Dr Guantai Mboroki, a senior distance-education lecturer at the university, has raised the alarm over the quality of the programmes being offered under the part-time arrangement. When contacted for a comment, the Commission for Higher Education boss, Prof Everret Standa promised to call back but did not do so.