Top 3 students with highest scores at Hanoi Medical University were forced to drop out
After receiving the results from the Son La Department of Education and Training regarding 3 candidates whose 2018 national high school exam scores were raised, Hanoi Medical University officially had grounds to expel these students.
Candidate VHL passed the General Medicine exam with a very high score, ranking 3rd in the whole school, with 28.4. Of which, the Math exam score was 9.4, Chemistry 9.5 and Biology 9.5. The recent assessment results of the Ministry of Education and Training showed that this student's scores were Math 5.6, Chemistry 3.4, Biology 4. Thus, this student was given an artificial increase of 15.3 points. Of which, the subject with the highest increase was Chemistry, 6.1 points.
After receiving official information from the Departments of Education and Training of Hoa Binh and Son La, the school's admissions board met and decided to expel two first-year students due to low assessment test scores and failure to meet the admission requirements.
In addition to VHL, another student from Son La who was admitted to the General Medicine Department of the Thanh Hoa branch of Hanoi Medical University was forced to drop out. He was the only student from Son La who was admitted to the General Medicine Department of this branch.
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| A midnight press conference of Mr. Mai Van Trinh, Director of the Department of Education Quality Management, Ministry of Education and Training in Son La in mid-July 2018. Photo: Nghiem Hue/Tien Phong. |
Thus, three medical students of Hanoi Medical University were eliminated from the "game" due to exam cheating, including two students from Son La and one from Hoa Binh.
The University of Commerce said that after the school sent the official dispatch, the Department of Education and Training of Hoa Binh responded. As a result, a candidate from Hoa Binh was admitted to the University of Commerce in 2018, but the assessment results showed that this candidate did not have enough points to be admitted to the school.
At the Foreign Trade University, the head of the Training Department said that of the three Hoa Binh students who were admitted due to inflated scores, two students returned their actual scores that were not high enough to be admitted. These two students will be forced to drop out of school and their previous admission decisions will be revoked. One student returned his actual score and still had enough points to be admitted, so he can study normally.
"Exam results for candidates involved in cheating should be canceled"
Directly related to the candidates whose scores were raised in the 2018 National High School Exam, many opinions disagree with the current handling. Dr. Do Ngoc Quyen said that in order to clearly distinguish between management thinking and the law, there are 3 issues that need to be resolved in this exam cheating case.
First, return the real score to the candidate as before the correction and confirm that this is cheating and violates the exam regulations.
Second, regardless of the real score, because of cheating, the National Examination Council needs to cancel the exam results, leading to cancellation of graduation recognition.
Third, regardless of the real score for university admission, universities need to cancel the admission results for candidates in this case.
Dr. Ngoc Quyen presented the “scenarios” that could happen today. In which, students had their results canceled and were expelled because they (students, parents, and related people) had actually committed fraud (some students had voluntarily asked to drop out before being expelled).
If the expelled student believes that he/she was wronged, because he/she did not cheat, he/she has the right to appeal, complain... and all statements such as "I/my child was harmed by grade correction" must be investigated and have an investigation conclusion by the authorities. The school does not do this.
When the investigation results are available, the candidate can bring the results to the school, requesting review and handling... At this time, it is the school's responsibility to make a decision on whether to continue studying or not. During the investigation period, the school may still allow the accused student to study temporarily, until the investigation results are available.
“All cases where real scores meet the standard cannot be automatically considered as no cheating or the motive for cheating can be ruled out. All arguments that 'my score was changed for the purpose of harming me', when there is no conclusion of the investigation, are just conspiracy theories, and cannot be the basis for the school to allow continued study,”
Meanwhile, a representative of the Ministry of Education and Training confirmed that some of the candidates who cheated on their exam scores could easily be forced to drop out of school, but there were also cases that were difficult to handle and there was no immediate solution. These were candidates who, when returning their real scores, were still eligible to be admitted to the university they were studying at, or candidates who did not use the increased combination for admission.
However, according to the reporter's investigation, the reason why the Ministry and schools are struggling to handle the issue is because the regulations do not have provisions on handling violations in the exam marking stage. The violations that the Ministry has brought up for handling are in the exam organization stage and are all "direct penalties". Therefore, the candidates whose scores were increased in the exam marking stage are not regulated by any provisions in the 2018 National High School Exam regulations.
There is only one way to handle this, which is to evaluate the results and return the real results to the candidates. In addition, there is currently no sanction to handle candidates who cheat on their exam scores.
