Cuba sentences 7 to jail for selling college entrance exam papers

Cuba sentences 7 to jail for selling college entrance exam papers
Xinhua News Agency November 5, 2014 7:40am

HAVANA, Nov. 4 (Xinhua) -- A Cuban court sentenced six teachers and an
employee of the Higher Education Ministry to prison terms ranging from
18 months to eight years for stealing and selling university entrance
exam papers, state daily Granma reported Tuesday.

The case, originally reported in early June, forced education
authorities to cancel the results of a May 6 entrance exam in
mathematics for students in Havana province and hold new exams, and to
modify Spanish and History tests.

The cheating scandal cost the Ministry of Higher Education more than
28,000 convertible Cuban pesos (CUCs) and the University of Havana more
than 1,000 CUCs, Granma said.

During the process of printing and packaging the exams, the
investigation showed, an employee of the printing house run by the
ministry stole copies of the tests and sold them to the teachers for 180
CUCs each. The teachers, in turn, charged students between 40 and 50
CUCs for access to the exams.

The court handed down the stiffest eight-year sentence to the employee
of the printing house. Two university teachers were sentenced to four
years in jail, and the rest, including one professor who used the
information to secure an advantage for his own children, to shorter jail
terms.

The court also ruled that the defendants had to compensate the ministry
and the University of Havana for the incurred costs of around 30,000
CUCs, and barred them from teaching.

The defendants' actions "undermined the prestige of our educational
system," Granma said. (One CUC is worth about one U.S. dollar.)

Source: Cuba sentences 7 to jail for selling college entrance exam
papers | GlobalPost -
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/xinhua-news-agency/141105/cuba-sentences-7-jail-selling-college-entrance-exam-papers