(aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2350 by Angharad Copyright© 2014 Angharad
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Another day, another school trip. I was down to invigilate from ten so when Sister Maria asked me to go with her, I wasn’t best pleased. I’d resolved to do some number crunching while students sweated over their exam papers, so my laptop and the university wi-fi should have been all I was concerned with.
“I really don’t have much time, headmistress, I have to invigilate an exam.”
“This won’t take a moment, Lady Cameron.”
I sighed but followed her to her office where she bid me sit. I deliberately looked at my watch. “We’ve been asked to enter a school’s quiz competition.”
I nodded wondering what it had to do with me.
“It’s mainly aimed at senior girls but I’d like your permission for Trish to take part.”
“What sort of quiz?”
“Oh, a team one, think University Challenge, but for sixteen year olds.”
“She’s a bit young to be associating with sixth formers.”
“Don’t worry, we’ll keep an eye on her.”
“Have you asked her, yet?”
“Not yet, I wanted your approval first.”
“When is it?”
“Beginning of July, it’s being held at our sister school in Southampton.”
“What just one day?”
“Yes, five or six schools take part and it’s like a knock out, with about three stages in it, the last being between the two remaining schools. Winner gets a trophy for a year and each of the four in the team get a small shield to keep.
“How are you going to choose your team?”
“We’ll have a series of quizzes for individuals to do with written answers, the best six scores will then be invited to join the team.”
“So you won’t field the same team each round?”
“We might, but it would be good to have a couple of reserves.”
“All right, but I suspect she won’t be too hot on popular culture.”
“They have a broad spectrum of subjects, so hopefully something for everyone.”
“When are you running your heats?”
“In June after the A-levels and GCSEs have finished.”
“You might find it worthwhile to invite Livvie to participate as well.”
“We’ll have a competition for younger children, but I don’t expect many to get very high marks.”
“Okay, you can invite my horde to try, but don’t be disappointed if none of them have the depth or breadth of general knowledge required.”
She thanked me and I dashed off to the main campus to park, collect some papers and a cuppa, then off to my torment for two hours. A colleague took the first hour—I should say colleagues because there’s usually two of us, a man and a woman in case someone needs to go to the toilet or some other emergency occurs. I’ve seen people vomit with nerves and once someone got their knickers twisted so tightly, they passed out. I hope that doesn’t happen this morning.
I finally got my act together and arrived at the hall they were using for the exam. I took my place at the desk in front of the candidates and powered up my computer. The exam was a botany one and it was at first year level. I had a quick look at it and decided I might have scraped a pass although I haven’t pottered with plants for about ten years—though I’d have gone with the phloem. That’s a botany joke—now you know why I did zoology and ecology, the latter is habitat forming. All right, so science jokes aren’t always the funniest though they did an article on them in the Guardian last year and some of them were very clever. A blowfly walked into a bar and asked, “Is this stool taken.” Okay, so it was rather shitty but I liked it.
I got into my own work and was quite involved with it when I became aware of someone standing by the side of me. “Cathy, I think we could have a bit of a problem.” It was my invigilator partner.
“Oh, what’s happened?”
“The girl in the red jeans, I think she might be using some sort of device.”
“What a computer or smart phone?”
“Yes, disguised as a calculator.”
“What do they need a calculator for in a botany exam?”
“God knows, but they’re allowed them in all science exams as you well know.”
“Yeah, but they’re university ones.”
“I think she could have swapped one.”
“Okay, I’ll take a look.” Such was my joy at being the senior member of staff, I was a reader to her senior lecturer status.
I approached the girl, “D’you mind if I borrow this a moment?” I picked it up and it was a standard university scientific calculator made by Texas instruments. I did a few calculations on it and it seemed in order. I thanked her and handed it back to her. As I wandered back to my desk it crossed my mind that as soon as she saw my colleague come to me, she’d swap her dodgy one back to the standard one.
That would mean it was on her person as she hadn’t bent over to her bag. Instead of sitting out the front I now wandered up and down the rows of candidates, mainly watching our prime suspect. I needed to find some way of challenging her. I spoke briefly with my colleague and she agreed to my suggestion.
The bell sounded and I told everyone to stop writing. I then asked them to turn their papers over, stand up and walk away from their desks. There were murmurs of surprise but most of them did so. Our suspect didn’t. When I insisted she did, there was a clatter at her feet caused by a calculator, except she still had one on her desk.
The device wasn’t a calculator at all but a smart phone made to look like one and information on it suggested she’d cheated. The rest of the papers were collected while we sent for the dean. It was horrible, I hate it when students cheat, because they’re only cheating themselves ultimately. When you catch one, it makes me feel sick—I’ve just destroyed someone’s dreams and career—or they have.
The young woman was suspended and her paper disqualified. She’ll be asked to leave very shortly—silly girl.
As I was leaving my broom cupboard to collect the girls from school, the girl with the red jeans confronted me. “What’s your problem with real women—jealousy?”
“I don’t have any problems with men or women—but I do with cheats. The degrees we award require the students to actually do some work during their time here. We don’t take kindly to those who try to beat the system, which has been tried and tested over the years.”
“I don’t believe you, you tranny.”
“I suggest you apologise. I did nothing wrong, it was you who broke the rules.”
“What d’you call wearing women’s clothes then when you’re really a bloke.”
“If the best you can do is to make malicious accusations, then I suggest you leave now.”
“Just wait, I’ll tell the Echo.”
“If you do, I’ll have the university say why you were sent down.”
“You can’t do that?”
“Can’t I? There were seventy five other students in that room, at least half of them saw you drop your phone—all of them feel angry that you tried to cheat and beat them. I’ll ask one of them to explain to the local rag, they’re not covered by the same confidentiality clauses. You, young woman, are history. Now leave or I’ll have you removed by the security staff.”
“You think you’re so clever don’t you?”
“No I’m not, I worked hard for my degrees.”
“I worked hard for my degrees,” she mimicked me in a silly voice.
“I wasn’t that clever, but I was a bloody sight smarter than you, now piss off.”
Comments
Cheaters
If they put as much work into studying as cheating they'd probably pass.
Portia
You are right Portia, but
You are right Portia, but unfortunately they want to do it the easy way.
A blowfly walked into a bar and asked, “Is this stool taken.”
*groannnnnnnnnn*
That pun is just 'twoooooo' much! ^_^
Cheats never prosper
or so the old saying goes, Thing is if she has tried it once chances are she will do it again in other parts of her life, Another saying also comes to mind one that would fit red jean girl down to a tee " Once a cheat always a cheat " Cathy needs to watch her back though, Cheats like that girl never know when to give up...
Kirri
Yep
cheating becomes a permanent crutch. It happened to me one time but it wasn't me who did the cheating, it was the instructor giving the oral questions and emphasizing the answers. I still feel filthy though.
I sort of cheated ...
... in electronics/electrical engineering exams by quickly memorising a few formulae I was having trouble with just before going into the examination hall and then writing them down as soon as the exam started on the question paper. Of course IIRC they never seemed to crop in the actual questions :)
We were never allowed calculators but slide rules were OK provided they didn't have standard forms printed on the back like a lot did. No calculators? We budding electronic engineers hadn't got round to inventing them yet and Friden electro/mechanical ones were too expensive, too big and too noisy.
Robi
For me it was really funny
I started college and for the first two years used a slide rule. Then I went away for about 3 years of military service. When I came back to college, slide rules were extinct and calculators had taken over. Kind of a culture shock... but that's the way of progress. Hey, in a few years kids will wonder what a CD was... and why do we talk about "dialing" a phone?
Would be nice if Cathy'd had a witness to the girl's
verbal attack. That kind of thing isn't really allowed. In some places there are laws against it. Not sure why the girl thinks that threatening Cathy with the tabloid press would matter. She's never hidden her background.
When the companies who
When the companies who created the SAT and ACT tests first announced that calculators would now be allowed for use during the tests, I was truly surprised. Mainly because I could recall when if even the mention of calculator use was almost good enough to have the person run out of town on a rail, after being tarred and feathered. For those who aren't knowledgeable of the American education system. These two tests, which actually consist of several segments are taken generally during a student's Junior/Senior year in High School and the test results are factors used in the College application process.
Cheating Has Even Become a Problem
with educators here in the U.S. The pressure to maintain Federal funding led a school system in Atlanta. GA. to resort to cheating by supplying the answers on assessment tests. The money was directly tied to how well the students performed. It never occurred to them they pretty much proved that they weren't performing to standards by the extreme lengths they went to to pad the scores. I never heard what their punishment was, but I believe the problem will only get worse among students who may have pressure to succeed by parents to the point they will resort to the extremes this girl went to, although I thinks her's is just a case of being to lazy to do the work. I think some schools will continue to resort to extreme measures like this to maintain their funding and that's wrong!
Too much...
catnip for Bonzi tonight? The puns were purr-fect.
Why do I have a feeling that Trish will receive a prize at the quiz competition?
Thanks for the continuation.
Good For You, Angharad !
Not only a CHEAT, but a cheeky BITCH too! What a rude COW! Deserved to be thrown out, that one did.
Briar
Great chapter
Thanks for continuing with 'bike' this week.
I hope Cathy had her trusty mobile recording everything as usual. I always find it sad that people feel the need to cheat rather than do their best. Ah well, perhaps I'm just feeling old.
Love to all
Anne G.
Cheating.
Sad to say throughout my early years I cheated, lied, ducked, dived and did just about anything to slide or slither undetected under the radar. It was I suppose part necessity for survival and part low self esteem but then I never took any academic exams throughout the years when other kids were in school. Cheating was about somehow fiddling extra food on my plate without it being noticed. Swapping sock labels in the laundry with stolen needle and thread to get myself better socks. Stealing lavatory paper from under the warden's noses when I cleaned the staff toilets so that I could defaecate in peace when I eventually got time and peace enough to 'go' in private or more correctly, in secret!
I finally only got out of the habit when I was caught trying to pad my overtime sheet when transiting the great lakes up the Welland Canal. Once again I had let down the only guys who had shown me decency, the captain, the bosun and the mate!!! I felt like shit when I was caught and it was the first time I genuinely felt remorse. On all other occasions I had simply put it down to 'not making the same mistake again'
When I finally got to the stage of sitting academic and professional exams at age 24 onwards I stopped cheating because I needed to prove to my self I had the wherewithal to achieve something worthwhile. Ang sums it up perfectly, for the exams to mean something they have to be honest exams and taken honestly by the examinees.
Why is it...
Why is it that those who cheat complain so much when they're caught and fight it so hard.
My spouse caught a student cheating on a minor assignment (with a number of student witnesses). Of course said student denied it. (Had student admitted it, student would have received a zero for the assignment which amounted for less than 1.5% of her final grade.)
The case went to the student honor board - they ruled the kid had cheated. The kid appealed all the way to University Provost. All concurred with original ruling (A half dozen witnesses, including spouse). Going to that level, Student was suspended, receiving a failing grade for that course, along with refusal to re-admit student. Student's parents took the case to state court... Went all the way to state supreme court... Where it was thrown out. Net result, student eventually graduated. But, school would not recommend student for any graduate studies (Student was Pre Med) which made it all but impossible for student to find a program to take the student... All for less than 1.5% of a total score.
I wonder what this kid will attempt to do. It would be nice were the kid actually learn from the experience. But what we're seeing so far doesn't sound promising.
Thanks,
Annette