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Priya12
Member
Has anybody got a response yet?
Nope!!! They said MID-August... I called this morning and I got asked to email them instead. Do you think if we all keep calling they'll eventually respond?Has anybody got a response yet?
No I kept it simple but in hindsight I would have as I think it’s a good point. Also very unprofessional for them to drag this past mid august without no communication on the delay. I’m just so disappointed with the ifoa right now.
I got this response about the rules:
“As our inquiries are on-going I can’t provide the exact number of individuals under investigation for plagiarism, however, I can say the number is very small percentage of the candidates sitting the April 2020 exams. We of course appreciate that for those who are currently under investigation it must be a stressful experience, but I must emphasise this is not a widespread issue for candidates.
For the avoidance of doubt: the materials you use are for reference purposes only. You should not copy either by pasting in material or typing it in manually word for word any content into your answer script. You can consider the material and express it in your own words. If you do copy, then this will be regarded as a breach of the Assessment Regulations. For certain questions that are closed answered or more definition based, there will of course be similarities in how students answer these. However, we do not expect students to be writing word-for-word text copied from any book or source material.”
Tbf this should be unacceptable but they know they can get away with it.
Personally, I think this is a very weak angle to pursue. It's an actuarial exam not a typing exam so the notion that you could just type lots of statements word for word doesn't really feel right to me. I doubt it's an excuse that employers would be particularly receptive to.It seems like the definition of "copy and paste" given by IFoA in the exam regs / FAQs (not sure which, which itself is probably important) was not sufficiently clear.
Presumably most would have taken this to mean you can't use Ctrl-C Ctrl-V from your electronic notes (which would likely be in MS word) to paste directly into your answer word document. This makes sense as there would be a time advantage. But from the above email, it seems like you were also not allowed to type word for word from your notes into the exam answer script. I don't believe this second interpretation was made at all clear prior to the April exams.
The FAQ page stated that the IFoA could use software to check for plagiarism. At the time you incorrectly said that they wouldn't.Did anyone specifically ask IFoA how their data was being processed with this software and when IFoA had sought their consent for this in line with GDPR and for a list of what their script was compared against?
The FAQ page stated that the IFoA could use software to check for plagiarism. At the time you incorrectly said that they wouldn't.
I'm not too sure of your point here - are you trying to argue that the IFoA are in the wrong as they took steps to identify possible plagiarism?As they state themselves, we have allegedly broken the assessment regulations. This wasn’t in the assessment regulation but an FAQ. They can’t assume everyone had seen the FAQ unless they refer to it in the assessment regulation (which they don’t). they did move this from the faq to the updated assessment regulation in July
I'm not too sure of your point here - are you trying to argue that the IFoA are in the wrong as they took steps to identify possible plagiarism?
I'm not too sure of your point here - are you trying to argue that the IFoA are in the wrong as they took steps to identify possible plagiarism?
Personally, I think this is a very weak angle to pursue. It's an actuarial exam not a typing exam so the notion that you could just type lots of statements word for word doesn't really feel right to me. I doubt it's an excuse that employers would be particularly receptive to.
I'm not trying to put you or anyone else off - just trying to give you a different perspective. Good luck with the process - I really hope that all candidates affected have a fair outcome.
As a professional examiner, I have not seen any exam operating in this fashion.
Has the Institute replied to any of the affected students yet? given that mid August has now passed.
I got an email yesterday saying that they've finalised their deliberations and will give an outcome within the next 5 working days