Followers of Suits, a USA Networks series, across the world might be well aware of Mike Ross' profession before he got roped in by Harvey Specter for the Pearson Hardman law firm. Ross made his living by taking bar and other law exams for students in exchange for a few hundred dollars before being hired as an associate for Harvey.
A similar scenario has been going on in the University of Colorado Denver (UCD) campus for a few months now.
The college officials have initiated an investigation into allegations of cheating by a number of international students. CBS4 Investigator Rick Sallinger has learnt that some of the students have been paying huge amounts in exchange for others to take online classes and tests for them.
"I've been offered substantial amounts of money," said a man who spoke on the condition of anonymity, CBS local reports. The man said that he had been offered $800 to $1,000 per class by international students.
"These individuals wanted people to log into all of their online classes," said the man. "They wanted people to go into their classes for them."
A list of names of students, who were caught allegedly cheating at the University's College of Business, has been obtained by CBS4. The redacted list showing 29 cases in the last year has not been confirmed by the school due to Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).
"I think the list shows we take academic dishonesty concerns very seriously and it also shows, because of the numbers on it, students are not going to be able to get away with it," Jacque Montgomery, Executive Director for Media Relations at CU-Denver, told CBS local.
Suspected students might be first subjected to an academic dishonesty committee. Following which they might be given a zero on assignments, suspended or expelled from the campus.
The cheating scandal questions the responsibility and the role of the exam supervisor and lecturers.
"Even if you go to class and take a test for someone else, you can get away with that sometimes since they aren't always checking who is taking the test," UCD student Adam Silkwood told CBS local. "You can put another student's ID number down on the test and the teacher will never know that."
In June, police arrested Caroline D., the mother of a 19-year-old student, Laetitia, at a Paris high school for attempting to sit in an English exam on behalf of her daughter. And early this year, Harvard University suspended 60 students and disciplined others for cheating in a final exam of an undergraduate politics course - Government 1310: 'Introduction to Congress.'
After several such cheating scandals, universities are now working on creating software that can detect plagiarism and Internet provider addresses.
