Professors fined for taking exams on behalf of students to prevent department's closure

Professors at a university in Gwangju who took exams on behalf of students and graded the answers themselves in an attempt to keep their department from being shut down were fined on Monday.

An image of a statue of Justitia, the goddess of justice [KOREA JOONGANG DAILY]

GWANGJU — Professors at a university in Gwangju who took exams on behalf of students and graded the answers themselves in an attempt to keep their department from being shut down were fined on Monday, along with a student who later blackmailed one of them.

The Gwangju District Court fined three professors and a teaching assistant between 1.5 million and 6 million won ($1,010 and $4,050) after finding them guilty of obstructing business or aiding in its obstruction.

The professors and the teaching assistant manipulated grades to prevent students from being expelled, which would have reduced enrollment and increased the risk of their department being closed.

They repeatedly wrote exam answers on behalf of students and graded them as legitimate submissions, with each doing this between four and 29 times between 2022 and 2024.

One professor also wrote exam answers for a course taken by their own sibling and submitted them for grading, as part of the broader scheme of academic fraud. Another professor also took a midterm exam on a student's behalf.

An assistant professor submitted a grade report to the university’s academic affairs office that included test results completed by a teaching assistant on behalf of a student, aiding in the academic fraud.

The professors told police they felt "compelled to ensure that students they had brought into the program would not be expelled."

A prosecution service logo [YONHAP]

The court also fined a student 1.5 million won for attempting to extort money from an assistant professor by threatening to report the misconduct to the Ministry of Education.

The student also called and sent threatening text messages to the assistant professor, then visited their office and demanded a refund of 3.6 million won in tuition for the first semester of the 2022 academic year, but failed to obtain the money. Authorities said the student had previously failed the assistant professor's class after not taking the exam and acted out of personal resentment.

Even though the court fined the professors, it did find mitigating circumstances.

“Even if illegal practices existed in reality, they cannot be justified under the name of custom," the court said. "But the defendants admitted their wrongdoing and showed remorse, the university’s academic affairs office — the victim of the obstruction — did not seek punishment, and the defendants did not obtain any financial benefit from the offenses."

This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom. BY CHOI KYEONG-HO, HWANG HEE-GYU [paik.jihwan@joongang.co.kr]