‘Completes’ in this case means that the third party makes a contribution to the work of the student, such that there is reasonable doubt as to whose work the assessment represents” ( Draper and Newton, 2017). A recent definition is “a basic relationship between three actors a student, their university, and a third party who completes assessments for the former to be submitted to the latter, but whose input is not permitted. For decades there has been research in to how and why students cheat how common it is, and ways in which it could be addressed.Ĭontract cheating, first defined by Clarke and Lancaster in the mid 2000's, ( Clarke and Lancaster, 2007) is a form of cheating where students actively get someone else to do their work for them.
Some students “cheat” on some assessments, meaning they acquire academic credit for work which is not their own. Assessment is the means by which HE providers determine whether their students have achieved the learning required for those roles. HE now forms a significant part of the economy for many countries around the world and is the means by which many people are trained to undertake important roles in society engineers, health professionals, lawyers etc. In 2014 there were 207 million students in Higher Education (HE), a number which has doubled since 2000 and accounts for one third of all school leavers ( Unesco, 2017). Recommendations are made for future studies on academic integrity and contract cheating specifically. Most samples were collected using designs which makes it likely that commercial contract cheating is under-reported, for example using convenience sampling, with a very low response rate and without guarantees of anonymity for participants. This increase may be due to an overall increase in self-reported cheating generally, rather than contract cheating specifically. A significant positive relationship was found between time and the percentage of students admitting to contract cheating. The data indicate that contract cheating is increasing in samples from 2014 to present the percentage of students admitting to paying someone else to undertake their work was 15.7%, potentially representing 31 million students around the world. Contract cheating was self-reported by a historic average of 3.52% of students. Seventy-one samples were identified from 65 studies, going back to 1978.
It also sought to evaluate the quality of the research evidence which addresses those questions. This study synthesized findings from prior research to try and determine how common commercial contract cheating is in Higher Education, and test whether it is increasing.
Many incidents involve payment of the third party, often a so-called “Essay Mill,” giving contract cheating a commercial aspect. Swansea University Medical School, Swansea, United KingdomĬontract cheating, where students recruit a third party to undertake their assignments, is frequently reported to be increasing, presenting a threat to academic standards and quality.