where’s the responsibility?

Yesterday, I took an exam. Graduate students, as you would expect, should be people who take learning seriously and study terribly hard for exams. I was shocked when 2 guys sitting beside me seemed shocked that there was an exam. After the lady left the room (she only came to give out the exam questions and left us to write our answers, assuming that graduate students are old enough to know to keep quiet and hardworking enough to have studied), the guys took out their handphone to make a call to confirm the date of the exam. Ok, since they weren’t using it to ask people for answers, so be it. There isn’t anything wrong with using a cellphone if you are not cheating with it, right? But then.. what about discussing exam questions? Is there an issue then? Those 2 guys started off whispering to each other, but eventually ended up having pretty loud exchanges that disturbed a lot of people. I was really pissed, and wanted so badly to shout at them to shut up and write their own answers, but held myself back as I didn’t want to disturb the rest of the students even more. I was sooo glad when a guys sitting right in front of them turned to say “can you please do your own answers?”. I was cheering for him deep down. Unfortunately, these guys don’t listen. They continued to discuss. Obviously their discussions were futile, coz both of them did not study for the exam, and I suspect they’ve never attended the class either. The guy beside me obviously saw me scribbling furiously, and decided that it was more wise to check out my answers. He was at questions 2 then, and I was at questions 7. He made it so blatant as to flip quickly to question 7 and turned to discuss my answer with his friend. I was so PISSED!! I started covering up my answers, sitting in weird positions.. and he happily changed his seating to continue checking out my answers! I’m so glad he never saw the though, coz some time later, he gave up and went back to his question 2. Then, the most unexpected thing happened. The guy in front (the one who barked at them earlier to shut up) turned and started discussing answers with them! By then, I was so angry at them that I was writing my answers as fast as I could, so I could leave the exam hall. I left an hour early in the end. Any longer and I would not be able to contain my anger.

I am totally dumbfounded by what happened. In undergraduate courses, cheating and copying is quite common in class tests, but even so, exams are treated more seriously. At those times, I just close an eye coz I know some people really resent what they’re doing, mostly coz they’ve been tricked or force into taking a course they didn’t like. However, graduate students obviously chose to further study because they have the interest, and they know this is the career they want to seek. Noone in the right mind would choose such a tough road for the fun of it. So if these people are serious about what they’re doing, why aren’t they putting in any effort at all? If there is interest, why is there still such behavior? To add on to that, we’re graduate students, old enough to take responsibility in what we do, matured enough to know what’s right and what’s not. What’s more, this exam consisted of questions that are easily answerable by JC students as these topics are simple stuff covered in JC! If they have never studied all these before, never attended the lectures, never even heard of such simple things before, I really question what they are doing with their lives. These 3 guys totally changed my impression of that particular nationality. Terribly ugly behavior.

(I just wrote to the authorities regarding this. I didn’t name any names, but simply suggested that maybe there should be invigilators for future exams. Sad to say, I have to ask them to treat us like young, immature undergraduates again. I chose not to name names simply because I do not want to make such a big hassle out of it, knowing that I am already known to be a complain queen by the school authorities within 3 months of candidature. Furthermore, I doubt that those students managed to get very far by trying to cheat, thus they should have already received their deserving punishment)