Economic students hustled

The Economics department has refused to comment on reports that some students cheated on the Microeconomics 2 exam in the first week of term.

Rumours circulated among second year students before and after the examination that a member of staff had given answers to around 10 international students prior to the exam. This would give them an especially unfair advantage in a paper where 70 per cent of the marks were awarded through multiple choice questions.

Vision asked the Department how many members of staff, including PhD students, had access to or had seen the exam script in advance. Deputy Head of Department Peter Smith said that the department, “does not comment to the media concerning examination matters.”

Second-year Economics student Luke Grant told Vision: “I worked incredibly hard for Micro 2, renowned for being one of the hardest Economics modules, and I feel cheated having put in so much effort. But if the department are lax enough that people can get away with this sort of thing, then well done to whoever has got the guts to do it.

“I question who wouldn’t take this opportunity if it was presented to them.”

Microeconomics 2 is a second year module compulsory for all Economics, PPE and joint honours students. The module has been subject to problems in the past, with formal complaints regarding the teaching and the examination of the course being made in the last two years. Complaints about the lectures and seminars have occurred again this year.

Students have been especially critical of the teaching style; they have been accused by a number of students of “humiliating” individuals in front of an entire lecture audience.

In their module feedback for the Autumn term, they dismissed these accusations, explaining: “I asked some students to go to the blackboard, and unfortunately, it became clear very quickly that one did not know even the most basic concepts that had been presented.

“I had to tell the student that he had not done his homework in Micro 2 and I also had to warn him… that he was going directly to disaster.”

The Department has since replaced both lecturers of the Microeconomic module with another senior member of staff, who will start at the beginning of the next academic year.