By: Victor Mutisya
Imagine a society where professionals earn their way to the top through dishonesty means. For instance, imagine of a doctor or an engineer or a driver who has earned the title through falsehood. Dishonesty destroys confidence and brings social chaos, so says Robert Greene. Academic dishonesty in particular, forfeits not only the way of getting skills but cements incompetence. In the long run it affects not only the individual involved but the society at large. In essence it does not just give unfair advantage to those who engage in it but also releases under-qualified individuals into the job market.
Living in a culture that emphasizes on meritocracy and credentials over Integrity and skills, shortcuts have become almost inevitable on the way to success. Shortcuts of climbing the academic pinnacle have replaced hard work and resilience. When success in life is only seen in the lens of academic prowess, the desire to succeed and the fear to fail comes in through the door, while integrity simultaneously jumps out through the window. Martin Luther King Jr denotes that, intelligence plus Character is the true goal of education. I suppose true success can only be a bridge between skills and credentials. Wait, but not anymore. What the culture now teaches us is, it doesn’t matter the means, the end justifies. In other words, it means it doesn’t matter how you get something provided you get it.
Conceived by the desire to succeed, academic dishonesty gives birth to skills deficit in the job market. This causes reduced productivity which in turn ails our economy. Compromised work place integrity and practices become rampant and along the way some negative ideologies become embedded on culture. For instance in our Nation, it’s believed that to succeed the most important factor is ‘connection’. By the way, any average Kenyan has heard of River Road where many believe that you can get whatever grade, for any level of education from any institution of your choice provided you have the ‘connection’. As a result of such ‘connections’ we not only compromise our means of production but as well all other systems in our country.
Often taking root in High Schools during internal and National exams, academic dishonesty finds it’s way into higher education institutions. I doubt how many Kenyans for instance have not heard about ‘Mwakenya’. But still we complain when we suffer one way or another in the hands of people who have earned their tittles dishonestly. This ranges from doctors to political leaders who get into service without acquiring the skills and expertise that is required to handle real world field challenges. Such individual cause menace and end up hurting ‘waliokuwa na wasiokuwa’
In conclusion, academic dishonesty erodes the very essence of our existence. It is a vice that requires a collective action to tackle. Using stricter academic credential verification processes, developing plagiarism detection tools and reforming assessment routines is very key towards combating academic dishonesty. Otherwise we will continue to suffer from ‘ mwiba wa kujidunga’ inflicted on us by unripe human capital in the job market.
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