Degrees of Deceptions: The Gravitation Towards the Death of Academic Integrity

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We often wonder why the labour market is flooded with people bearing certificates but lacking initiatives or ideas? We wonder why we have so many graduates with impressive qualifications yet only few are problem solvers. It is quite satirical that a student who graduated with a 2.1 or 2.2 can optimize his/her certificate but a First Class student still sits there, waiting on the government to provide jobs. It is either one of the two, the educational system is breeding minds of intellectuals who can only pass but not think or the degrees held by many are not theirs.

Examination malpractice is no longer the whispered scandal of the powerless, it has transformed into a pervasive culture, one that corrupts the very foundation of education. In universities across Nigeria, what once would’ve been considered a moral failure is increasingly treated as a strategy, a means of survival, or even an entitlement. Students smuggle notes, use electronic devices, negotiate with invigilators, and build cheat networks. We now stare this uncomfortable truth in the eye, the era of cheating becoming normalized and degrees which were once the hallmark of merits and competence have now turned into monuments of deception.

When students openly say “everybody does it,” when you see phones blinking under desks, when exam halls resound with silent collusion, we no longer speak of isolated incidents, we speak of a system built on rot. That system is not sustained by the powerless; it is enabled by those who should guard standards, lecturers who turn blind eyes, invigilators who hand out blank sheets as favours, and institutions that publicly condemn malpractice but privately reward offenders. The result is a compromised academic environment where integrity is optional, and merit becomes a myth.

Many defend malpractice with tired excuses: “the system has already been broken, I can’t afford to fail, the syllabus is too bulky.” Indeed, poor infrastructure, overcrowded classes, underpaid faculties, and the pressure to pass are real challenges. But these structural problems do not justify cheating; they demand reform. To accept malpractice as necessary is to surrender the hope of real improvement. Every time a student chooses cheating over study, they reinforce a culture that devalues the place of hardwork, discipline, accountability and knowledge.

The damage of widespread cheating goes farther than the walls of a classroom. A society built on dishonesty is a society without trust. When malpractice infiltrates education, the value of diplomas falls. Employers and institutions begin to question whether graduates can perform. The person who cheated through Engineering might later design buildings that collapse; the one who cheated through Medicine may misdiagnose patients or forget an instrument in the body during surgeries. When we treat cheating as a joke, we carry it into governance, industry, and public service. The roots of corruption, fraud, and incompetence are watered early in examination halls.

Students now argue that: “I’m just trying to level the playing field.” But when the game is rigged in favour of those who cheat, leveling means descending, stooping low and lower. If the honest student refuses to cheat, they are penalized not by moral judgment but by failing grades, exclusion, and a system that rewards shortcuts. The cheating student progresses, while the honest one is stuck. This dynamic demoralizes integrity and elevates expediency. The outcome is not shy, integrity becomes a burden too heavy for those with less influence or network.

The complicity of power is one of the darkest secrets in this phenomenon. Lecturers sometimes leak exam questions to favoured students. Some invigilators circulate crib sheets or wink at patterned cheating. Worse, in universities such as Nnamdi Azikiwe University popularly known as UNIZIK, investigations have exposed lecturers who extort students for extra marks, turning academic success into a transaction. 

Legislation and institutional rules exist for example, Nigeria’s Examination Malpractice Act (Cap E15 Laws of Federation) criminalizes cheating and related offenses but laws without enforcement are empty and at best, not there. Many students who cheat are never caught or punished. Some are penalized only symbolically, their results canceled behind closed doors, their names never public. Worse, some expulsions happen without fair hearing or transparent appeal, leaving accused students voiceless and stigmatized. 

True restoration demands more than punishment, it requires transformation. Assessment methods must evolve, rely less on high-stakes exams and more on assignments, projects, continuous assessment, oral defenses, and innovation-based tasks. These reduce opportunities for wholesale cheating. Technology can assist, biometric authentication, encrypted exam platforms, surveillance, plagiarism detection, randomized questions, and AI proctoring. But tech is not silver, if oversight is compromised, technology becomes another tool for fraud. A system that trusts itself must trust its ways as well, it is inequity to reprobate and approbate.

Accountability must cascade upward and invigilators and lecturers must answer for misconduct. If a lecturer leaks a question or protects cheats, they should face transparent investigation and consequences. Oversight committees must be independent and credible, not beholden to political pressures or favoritism. Students must have channels to report malpractice safely with protections from retaliation. More importantly, whistleblowers should be honored, not punished or martyred. 

Culture matters more than punishment. The ethos of education must reaffirm that knowledge is earned, not bought. Honour must outweigh convenience. Students should see merit, not shortcuts, as essential to dignity. Peer pressure should stigmatize cheating, not normalize it. Campus journalism must become bolder, investigative reports on malpractice, exposés of complicit staff, public dialogue about integrity. When the press shines light, darkness recedes.

The first step is painful admission, universities across Nigeria tolerate malpractice. The next step is collective refusal, students, lecturers, administrators all must demand integrity. Every cheat exposed, every corrupt actor held accountable nips away at the culture. When honest students refuse to hide, when integrity becomes preferable to shortcuts, transformation begins.

Examination malpractice is not a trivial campus problem, it is a cancer that sweeps to nought the soul of education and the foundation of our future. Let us not celebrate degrees born of deception. Let us instead challenge ourselves, demand reform, and restore the honor of academic pursuit. eEery student must understand that the path of integrity is steep and lonely, but it is the only one that leads to genuine success.

When we reclaim honesty in exam halls, we reclaim trust in institutions, dignity in certificates, and hope for a nation where education means enlightenment.