By Kim Rahn
Staff Reporter


Those found cheating on college entrance exams will be banned from applying for the test again for the next three years, the Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development said Monday amid the shock from the high school students’ large-scale cheating scandal using cell phones.

The ministry said it will prepare measures to cope with cheating in state-run annual College Scholastic Ability Test by January, following the discovery of an incident involving group cheating during last week’s exam.

Education Minister Ahn Byung-young said during a National Assembly hearing that the authorities will develop measures to ban students involved in illegalities in tests from applying for the exams, adding the ban period may extend to three years.

Under current regulations, the scores of those found cheating in the test are annulled but they are allowed to take the exam again the following year.

``We’ll investigate the technical possibility of setting up facilities such as metal detectors at classrooms where the tests are held, as well as consider increasing the number of supervisors in the classrooms,’’ Minister Ahn said.

The Information and Communication Minister Chin Dae-je also said the ministry will consider setting up devices capable of intercepting electrical communications in all classrooms in cooperation with the Education Ministry.

Six high school seniors in Kwangju who led the cheating scheme involving more than 140 students have been arrested and another six have been detained by police.

With 22 seniors behind the plan, 39 high school seniors with good grades reportedly sent their answers through cell phones to 37 first-grade and second-grade assistants outside the classrooms.

The assistants sent the answers back to the senders and to another 42 students who usually got low scores. A university student was also found to have managed the assistants, according to the police.

Police are expanding their investigations after some students claimed that the cheating methods had been handed down from others who had already graduated from high school.

They are also investigating the money spent by the students, as testimony has revealed 500,000 won was collected from each student for two subjects to purchase the cell phones and other devices.

Actually they collected a total of 20.85 million won from the 42 students, who gave the masterminds of the cheating scam 300,000 won to 900,000 won each.

rahnita@koreatimes.co.kr