Earlier this month, the University of South Africa (Unisa) released a statement reinforcing its student examination rules, in preparation for the May/June 2023 online exams. The institution's mid-year exams began on Monday, 8 May 2023.
In the past, students have taken advantage of the fact that the Unisa exams are administered online, which has led to an increase in exam cheating and plagiarism.
Unisa stressed that listening to any audio (music) and utilising audio-to-text software has been strictly prohibited during exams, unless use of the software is related to a student’s assistive device which has been declared.
However, students have now raised concerns, as some may be writing in public spaces where music or other unrelated sound disturbances are playing in the background.
We have received students’ concerns regarding the prohibition of listening to music during the online assessment.
Unisa affirmed, “If we find that you were indeed in a public space where music is being played, we will take that into consideration while evaluating your online invigilated assessment.”
The institution has assured students that all proctoring or invigilation recordings are reviewed to ensure students were not attempting to avert the proctoring or invigilation tool or engage in any prohibited activities during their assessment.
Students have been reminded that muting their phone or computer microphones is a transgression of Unisa’s rules and should be avoided.
Unisa Exam Rules & Regulations
The university has reiterated that any attempts to cheat or engage in any misconduct during the exams will have serious consequences, thus all students are expected to adhere to the rules and regulations.
Unisa noted that students who minimise or exit the invigilator app during their online assessment will be deemed to be out of the App. They explain, “Students who have been identified as out of app for a total than 10 minutes will have their marks withheld.”
In addition, students who have also early prompt “finish assessment” on the App while the continue to write thereafter will be deemed to have transgressed Unisa’s rules.
Furthermore, Unisa also strictly prohibits the use of any Artificial Intelligence software (ChatGPT, etc) and online sources (Course Material) during your online examination session.
Students are encouraged to make use of all the resources and study materials available to them in order to adequately prepare themselves for assessments, this includes student guidelines on online assessment on myExams, training videos for navigating on Invigilation tools, and other technical resources.
