Head of Public Affairs at the West African Examination Council, John Kapi has indicated that candidates suspected of using AI generated answers in the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), for which their results have been will be given a fair hearing on their case during investigations.
Following the release of the WASSCE results by West African Examination Council (WAEC), the council released a press statement disclosing that the subject results of candidates from 235 schools have been withheld for allegedly using artificial intelligence (A.I.) generated answers during examinations.
This has raised numerous questions as to how the said information was ascertained.
Speaking on Campus Exclusive earlier today on how this was detected, Mr. Kapi explained that captions and choice of word used in the answers were unfamiliar, hence raising suspicion of the use of artificial intelligence.
“There are some of the questions that were specific, but we find that the candidates were providing a certain general response. And it’s obvious that this is not coming from the individual because you can tell from the language use.”
“So these are cases that we suspect are a result of the use of AI. And that is what we are investigating. Obviously, that is why we will tell you we will not cancel them. Candidates are going to be met by our officer in all the regional capitals. We are compiling them according to regions; when we are done, officers will go to all our regional offices and candidates are going to be sent messages to meet with us over there with their guardians, a lawyer, or if they have a teacher who is coming along with them, then we put it before them and then hear their side of the story.”
“For all the results that we would tell, that is a process that we go through to ensure that the candidates have the opportunity to answer questions or to defend themselves if you want.”
He also highlighted the evolving challenge of cheating methods, noting that this year had the highest record of students bringing in mobile phones for the examination.
“The major challenge that we had was the increased use of mobile phones in examination halls. For this particular year, I think that so far this is the highest we’ve had of the use of mobile phones in examination halls and also with the ones that we’ve with health. So far, it’s been a detected response to the suspected AI generation.”
John Kapi further stated that WAEC is putting strategies to educate students and invigilators on the consequences of engaging in any form of examination malpractice. He also called on parents to desist from involving themselves in such activities for their ward.
“…the candidates play our emulators and supervisors about the dangers of, you know, examining more practices who want to ensure that our emulators are being vigilant enough, who want to ensure that our supervisors are doing what they have to do.”
“And we want to plead with parents to avoid getting into situations where the children are found engaged in some of these more practices. It has a lot of implications on their future.”
