The body that runs the International Baccalaureate (IB) diploma programme has said scores will remain consistent with previous years and that grade boundaries will not be increased even though time zone cheating had been discovered earlier this year.
In an email sent out this week by IB’s Director of Assessment, Matt Glanville, the International Baccalaureate Organization said it was “confident” no students had been disadvantaged due to the actions of those who had cheated, and acknowledged that significant stress had been caused by online speculation surrounding time zone cheating.
“We want to assure you that despite these challenges, the meaning of grades remains consistent with previous years and grade boundaries have not been inflated. We are confident that no individual student has been disadvantaged by these circumstances,” Glanville said.
More than 190,000 IB candidates who sat the exam in May around the world will receive their results this Saturday.
Time zone cheating occurs when students who have completed their exam papers share what they can recall from memory on social media before those in later time zones take the test.
In the exams sat between April 24 and May 17 this year, some students in Europe claimed they had read leaked questions and answers provided on a Telegram channel ahead of their tests. Others in Asia said the leak happened after they had sat the tests.
Screenshots were also found of a Telegram channel that contained links to questions for business management, global politics, mathematics, physics, computer science, biology and chemistry.
The leaks triggered widespread outrage and calls from students, including those from Hong Kong, for the tests to be cancelled or retaken.
The organisation admitted it had discovered a small number of students had engaged in time zone cheating but said there was “no evidence” the problem had been widespread.
In 2022, the IB body said the impact of the pandemic on students had been considered throughout its grade-awarding process and that appropriate grade boundaries had been recalibrated to account for disruptions to education caused by Covid-19.
After the time zone cheating came to light in early May, Glanville sent an email telling students the organisation had identified a number of those who had driven the social media posts relating to the leaked paper, and had worked with their schools to commence formal investigations.
The organisation also pledged to review the time zone arrangements for subsequent exams.
“The IB is already part way through innovations to minimise the impact of any [unethical] behaviour by students, for example, imposing formal start times for exams in each country and moving to have three exam zones across the world. We will of course review these after analysis of behaviours we see this year,” it said.
