In order to send their children to top schools, parents and schools work together to "tamper" with transcripts

Letsight

2024-05-17 09:00Published in Beijing

School grades reflect a student's academic level and ability throughout high school or college.

The score on the transcript not only affects the student's graduation, but also is the most important indicator in the application for studying abroad and employment.

Recently, it was revealed that a student failed his grades during school, and the school cooperated with the absurdity of "beautifying" the transcript.

Incredibly, in the field of international education, such a thing has become a "routine operation" in individual schools.

01

If the student fails the course, the grade will be modified according to "trouble".

A few days ago, Teacher Qin from a university in Xi'an said that in January this year, after the final results of the course he took came out, the parents of a student Chen who had failed to pass the grades asked to revise the grades.

The reason is that the child is studying for both bachelor's and master's degrees, and failing to pass the grades will affect the child's future.

Teacher Qin immediately reviewed Chen's test papers, and after checking that they were correct, she refused to make changes to the parents.

In fact, when Mr. Qin was scoring, he had already shown mercy. Student Chen scored 25 points on the paper, and his usual score was 90 points, and he still failed when the favor score was full, with a comprehensive score of 45 points.

When the parents failed to achieve their goal, they began to verbally threaten the teacher, claiming that they knew Teacher Qin's home address.

This parent did not consider whether the child studied seriously at all, and once something went wrong, he would trouble Teacher Qin.

It can also be seen from the dialogue between the parents and Teacher Qin that the parents completely stand on the moral high ground and accuse the teacher, thinking that Teacher Qin's test papers are too difficult, the marking papers are too casual, and "there is no teacher morality for the future generation of the motherland".

Parents also said that more than half of the students failed because of the teacher's teaching problem, and they would continue to complain.

Soon Mr. Qin's college received a report letter, and some people complained that he arbitrarily reduced class hours, failed to correct homework as required, and failed to tutor students as required.

But after investigation, it was found that this is all nonsense, and behind the malicious complaint is someone who is playing ghosts.

Mr. Qin is reasonable and compliant in teaching, and there is no mistake, and the reviewed test papers meet the requirements of the syllabus, the difficulty is moderate, and there is no problem in grading.

originally thought that evil could not prevail over good, but unexpectedly, Mr. Qin received calls from many school leaders.

The leaders all have a common demand, that is, to revise Chen's grades. Because this parent has a background and is a member of the academician team of a research institute.

After the intervention of the college leaders and personnel, the school conducted a make-up examination for the students who failed the course, and Chen "magically" passed the make-up examination.

Also in this school, there was another incident of revising grades.

Mr. Wang has been admitted to the graduate school of this university, but he failed the final exam, and the final score after the make-up examination was only 56 points.

In the case of threatening to jump off the building, the school bypassed the teacher in charge of the class, and other teachers made a correction explanation for his grades, helping him change his score from 45 to 60 points, which was called "saving" the students.

Children who can cry have milk to eat, as long as they can cry and make trouble, and if they fail, they can also arrange a make-up exam to let you pass, or directly modify the score to 60 points.

Isn't it ironic that such absurdities are happening in higher education institutions?

If the results can be modified according to the "noise", where is the fairness of the test? What do students go to college for?

02

Revision of transcripts, "routine operations" for study abroad applications

When it comes to revising grades, it can be regarded as a common operation in studying abroad applications, and the revision of grades by universities for students also exposes the problems of college admissions at home and abroad.

Recently, many HKU Business School graduate students admitted in September 2023 have received emails asking them to supplement their undergraduate background information and submit transcripts.

According to incomplete statistics, more than 200 students received the email, and all of them were students of the business school, and it is unknown whether other schools were involved.

There is news that the cause of the incident is that a master's student is suspected of plagiarism in coursework and previous disciplinary violations, so HKU questioned the student's application materials.

The school requires them to contact the undergraduate institution to directly deliver the transcripts to prove the authenticity. However, the student failed to provide a transcript in time.

If one person violates the rules, it will affect others. This raised further suspicions about other students' application materials.

According to people familiar with the matter, many schools in China have helped students revise their grades in the U.S. application.

NACAC, the American College Admissions Advisory Council, once said that among the important factors in determining admission, GPA always ranks first, which can reflect the academic level and level of students throughout high school.

As a result, when the child's GPA is not satisfactory, parents try their best to revise their grades, hoping to improve their GPA and apply to better universities.

There are also some schools that are willing to raise their children's GPAs. Because the child has a good admission, he can expand the school's honor roll in the future.

The cost of revising your transcript is low, but the benefits can be high.

Because a high GPA will have a greater chance of getting a better offer, which is a tripartite thing that benefits students, parents, and schools.

If you change it, I will change it, and in the end, everyone will change it together. Since everyone can easily improve their grades, they don't need to study so hard and don't need to bear any integrity issues.

Revising the GPA is a conspiracy between students, parents, and schools on the same chain of interests, and as a result, educational fairness and integrity are challenged.

03

If you can deceive yourself, you can't deceive everyone

Although foreign universities are geographically far away from us, admissions officers have a deep understanding of domestic high schools.

They may even have a "blacklist" of cases of student fraud at certain schools, or a history of falsification of school transcripts.

They are well aware of how easy it is for students from prestigious high schools to get a high GPA, and there are a range of ways to tell if an applicant's GPA is true.

For example, the applicant's school gives strict scores, but the applicant has obtained high scores in all aspects, and the SAT, TOEFL and other exams are obviously holding back.

For example, the applicant's transcript, standardization, and TOEFL are all impeccable, but some mistakes that high-level students should not make in the essay.

It can be said that the admissions officers who have been immersed in the United States for many years have long been sharp-eyed.

Although it is rare in the news to see a student who enters college and is fired because of a fake high school transcript.

As everyone knows, these students who are suspected of falsifying their transcripts may have been blocked outside the school's acceptance rate threshold early.

And it is precisely because they can't see the consequences that many students, parents and schools think that the results are fraudulent and take risks.

Some students may be "lucky" to successfully enter the top prestigious schools through transcript fraud, but under the strong study pressure, they are unable to adapt in the end.

The official website of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology clearly mentions:

We know that studying at MIT can be stressful, sometimes requiring several assignments in a day, or preparing for a qualifying exam or writing a dissertation report, but we expect students to approach their studies with honesty and integrity.

Whether you're working on a problem set, writing a lab report, working on a project, or writing a dissertation, you should avoid academic misconduct like plagiarism, improper cooperation, cheating, and more.

Students with a history of fraud can only survive their college careers by taking exams, writing on behalf of others, and cheating. But the more dishonest the behavior, the easier it is to be exposed, and sooner or later it will be revealed.

Once faked, the stain will accompany you for life.

In recent years, there have been frequent incidents of Chinese students being expelled for falsifying application materials and cheating on exams, and the academic integrity of Chinese students is at stake.

The transcript fraud has also created a distrust among overseas universities about the academic integrity of all Chinese applicants.

This situation will make it increasingly difficult for Chinese students to apply to prestigious overseas universities.

Last year, the University of Sydney discovered that students used fake high Chinese and English test scores to fraudulently obtain admission qualifications.

Since most of the counterfeiters are Chinese citizens or students with Chinese backgrounds, the school is considering introducing stricter admission requirements for Chinese citizens.

Transcript fraud seems to be the behavior of a student, a family, or a school, and it affects an individual's chances of admission.

However, it reflects the level of education in China as a whole and the integrity of all Chinese students, and deepens the negative impression of Chinese students in overseas universities.

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