A North West teacher who allegedly gave her Grade 12 pupils memoranda of June exam papers using the messaging application Whatsapp has disappeared without a trace. And if she fails to report for duty today, her salary will be stopped.
Rebecca Quarcoo was hired temporarily in February by the North West education department to teach life sciences at Monchusi Secondary School in Morokweng.
Education spokesman Elias Malindi said Quarcoo used Whatsapp as her special teaching method to communicate with pupils about difficulties they encountered i n the subject.
"We found out that this teacher gave her pupils the right to ask her anything on the subject using Whatsapp, even when they were at home. That was the relationship she had with her pupils."
Malindi said the teacher then went overboard and decided to send section A of the memorandum to her pupils. Excited pupils told their classmates that they had aced the exam because their teacher gave them the answers before the exam.
That did not sit well with pupils in the same class who did not have Whatsapp or cellphones. They reported the irregularity to their parents .
Malindi said one parent reported the incident to the department. "We immediately acted on the allegations and found that it was true.
"We sent our investigating team to the school in order to get an explanation from the teacher but she was nowhere to be found," he said.
Quarcoo had given the pupils only one section of the paper, so it would not be necessary for them to rewrite the entire paper. "The memorandum they received was just a small portion of the paper, we can determine from other sections on that paper to see if they passed or not."
The Democratic Alliance in the province called on the education department to launch a full investigation into examination irregularities at the school.
What's up, teacher? Pupils given answers before the examination
A North West teacher who allegedly gave her Grade 12 pupils memoranda of June exam papers using the messaging application Whatsapp has disappeared without a trace. And if she fails to report for duty today, her salary will be stopped.
Rebecca Quarcoo was hired temporarily in February by the North West education department to teach life sciences at Monchusi Secondary School in Morokweng.
Education spokesman Elias Malindi said Quarcoo used Whatsapp as her special teaching method to communicate with pupils about difficulties they encountered i n the subject.
"We found out that this teacher gave her pupils the right to ask her anything on the subject using Whatsapp, even when they were at home. That was the relationship she had with her pupils."
Malindi said the teacher then went overboard and decided to send section A of the memorandum to her pupils. Excited pupils told their classmates that they had aced the exam because their teacher gave them the answers before the exam.
That did not sit well with pupils in the same class who did not have Whatsapp or cellphones. They reported the irregularity to their parents .
Malindi said one parent reported the incident to the department. "We immediately acted on the allegations and found that it was true.
"We sent our investigating team to the school in order to get an explanation from the teacher but she was nowhere to be found," he said.
Quarcoo had given the pupils only one section of the paper, so it would not be necessary for them to rewrite the entire paper. "The memorandum they received was just a small portion of the paper, we can determine from other sections on that paper to see if they passed or not."
The Democratic Alliance in the province called on the education department to launch a full investigation into examination irregularities at the school.
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