Nigeria Abroad
As education increasingly becomes conducted remotely, a recent CBS investigation has uncovered that American college students are outsourcing schoolwork to Kenyans and Nigerian writers who are paid thousands of dollars a month to do everything from writing essays to complete entire college degrees for Americans studying at universities to doing their research.
The essay-for-hire scheme has been going on for years. The term “contract cheating” was coined to describe this practice and it has only expanded as online education continues to dominate.
Although contract cheating is considered illegal in 17 states it hasn’t been outlawed on the federal level.
Americans will pay between $20 and $50 per page to have their essays completed by African writers who sometimes subcontract the work out to other writers, paying them as little as $5 a page. The writers complete schoolwork in courses like engineering, history, and psychology.
The parties often meet through freelancing platforms like Fiverr, Upwork and websites like Essay JedII, which do offer legitimate services like tutoring assistance. In a statement, the website told CBS it was “unpleasantly surprised” to learn that the platform was being used in such a way, but stated, “any delivered products are considered as research services and/or original samples and should not be used as completed papers for further submission in educational establishments, however, we cannot control or limit its further usage as the consumer owns the copyright.”
The writers are given students’ college login information. CBS confirmed that the account information belonged to students enrolled at universities. One of the writers, William explained that when a student received a 97 percent on an essay he wrote, he was asked to “lower it down” to match the student’s actual performance level.
A bill introduced in the United Kingdom’s House of Commons in February is intended to crack down on the “essay mills” problem that grew worse during the pandemic.
However, in regards to where the students are located, the issue is international. According to Member of Parliament Chris Skidmore, the number of essay mills in the U.K. increased from 881 to 932 just between October 2020 and February 2021.
This issue wouldn’t likely stop because more American students are unable to meet up with school work and a lot of African writers are unemployed and need to earn in dollars from freelancing. This makes it a supply and demand circle that wouldn’t die because the demand will always be available.
