Dessy Sagita & Arientha Primanita – With the national school examinations looming later this month, educators are focusing on tight supervision to prevent the recurring problems of leaked test papers and cheating.

Arief Rachman, an education expert, said on Monday that it was difficult to stop people from selling copies of the exam question sheets because demand was always high. He also said that to prevent cheating inside the exam room, students should only be allowed to enter with the bare minimum of stationery.

"It's not enough to tighten the supervision. It has to be super tight," he told the Jakarta Globe. "Every student must be checked thoroughly before they enter the test venue."

Mungin Eddy Wibowo, a member of the National Education Standardization Agency (BSNP), said this year's national exams would be conducted in a much more efficient manner to prevent cheating. "We will anticipate every possible leak and we won't allow any of the incidents that occurred in previous years to recur," he said.

In 2009, thousands of students from 34 schools across eight provinces were found to have cheated in the national exams by filling in their test papers with answers they had bought from a syndicate claiming to have the test copy. The answers turned out to be wrong and the students who used them failed and did not graduate.

The fact that every single student from each of the 34 schools cheated raised suspicions that the teachers supervising the exams were party to the cheating. In the wake of the scandal, the Ministry of National Education promised to investigate the incident.

"This year, we will provide a layered security system to secure the question sheets, while police officers and independent supervisors from various universities will monitor the distribution of the papers from the printing company to the schools," Mungin said.

He also said that this year, the question sheets would be divided into five versions with the same level of difficulty.

"So in each class of 20 students, five different versions of the question sheet will be distributed randomly, making it very difficult for the students to cheat or to copy their friends' work," he said.

Mungin said that spare question sheets would also be different from the five main versions to further prevent cheating.

"We have also selected only trustworthy teachers to supervise the exams," he said. "The teacher in charge of a given subject will not be allowed at the school on the day that the exam for that subject is being taken. We realize there will always be ways for students to cheat, but we're optimistic that we have made every possible effort to minimize cheating and leaks."

Arief said the best way to prevent teachers from unfairly helping their students was to bring in more independent parties to supervise the tests. "Hire people from nongovernmental organizations if we have to, because some teachers tend to be soft on their students to help them pass the exams," he said.

Both Arief and Mungin agreed that the role of the police in the exams should not extend to monitoring the venues. "Even though we want the national exams to be as fair as possible, having policemen walking around on school grounds could intimidate the students and distract their attention," Arief said.

He said police involvement should be strictly limited to monitoring the printing company and the distribution of the question sheets. "In many cases, those who leak the questions are insiders working for the printing company. The police should be aware of this," he said. "But don't get too close to the schools. We don't want them scaring the kids."

Education Minister Muhammad Nuh had said that his ministry was prepared to impose strict sanctions on schools caught manipulating the exams in any way. Mungin said any indication of violations would see the offending school and students immediately barred from the exams.

Baharuddin, the principal of a state senior high school in Jambi province on Sumatra Island, said that as much as he wanted his students to pass the test, he would comply fully with the ministry's regulations.

"I've warned all teachers at the school not to let their feelings for the students cloud their judgment, because by helping the students cheat they will only do more damage," he said.