Educational authorities deny swap of answer sheets for college entrance exam

Educational authorities in central China’s Henan Province on August 7 clarified doubts over four students’ answer sheets for the college entrance exam, saying the exam papers did belong to the corresponding students.

Earlier, the parents of four students filed reports with the province's discipline inspection commission because alleging that the sheets weren't actually from their children and were swapped, Xinhua news agency reported.

The four examinees were from the cities of Zhoukou, Luoyang, Shangqiu and Xinyang, according to a report letter that went viral online.

Their parents said they checked the duplicated sheets since the scores their children achieved in the college entrance examinations were much lower than what they anticipated, and were lower than their usual performance. They also noted the handwriting on the sheets seemed to be someone else’s.

One of the parents even submitted a composition her daughter wrote down from memory to authorities for further handwriting authentication.

According to one of the parents, surnamed Lu, signs exist that names, exam registration numbers or seat numbers may have been erased on her daughter’s answer sheets for four subjects. Four different exam numbers appeared on her answer sheets for four subjects.

However, the province’s office of student recruitment released a statement on August 7, saying they double-checked all the information on the answer sheets, including the students' names, exam registration numbers, exam room numbers and seat numbers, and found them to be consistent with the bar codes on the answer sheets.

The handwriting on the answer sheets were also consistent, the office added.

It also said further investigation is continuing.