Why are universities catching only 1 in 100 cheaters when the real figure is much higher? - SBS

SBS Chinese hires a ghostwriter to produce a made-to-order university essay. We then put teachers to the test to see what happens once and if they spot the fraudulent work.

Highlights

• It is estimated that 10 per cent of Australian university students submit assignments written by somebody else.
• Students from a non-English speaking background are three times more likely to cheat, according to one expert.
• Academics say they don’t have the resources or time to catch students who cheat.

The second half of November usually marks the beginning of the summer break for students enrolled at Australian universities.

But for academics, this period is often when the workload ramps up as it’s when end-of-year assignments are marked and students are notified of their performance.

Even under timeframe pressure, an SBS Chinese investigation has found that teachers are often able to distinguish between assignments genuinely written by a student and pieces written by a person other than the student, an arrangement known as “contract cheating”.

However, despite the relatively high occurrence of cheating according to the academics consulted during this investigation and research which suggests that 1 in 10 students submit ghostwritten work, it’s been found that around 95 per cent get away with it.

Putting academics to the test

In order to understand the scope of the problem, SBS Chinese tracked down a ghostwriter through the Chinese social media platform WeChat and hired them to write a...

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