MANILA, Philippines — More than 20,000 examinees will need to retake the qualifying test at the West Visayas State University in the Western Visayas region after officials confirmed that the admission test questions were leaked among some examinees.
A total of 20,925 applicants took the admission test on March 10.
In an advisory on March 15, the WVSU administration said that it has agreed to "invalidate" the exam after preliminary findings by the investigating committee pointed to a leak of the examination items by still unidentified individuals.
"There is reason to believe that the integrity of the examination has been compromised,” the advisory read.
The university said it will soon announce the schedule for the retake of the admission exams, which will held in its various testing centers.
"While the administration has moved forward through this difficult decision, we assure the public that the ongoing investigation will continue to proceed to identify accountable individuals for this breach," the statement read.
The statement also explained that conducting another test will "eliminate undue advantage for specific individuals who may have benefitted from the leaked examination items."
"We empathize with the student examinees and their families for the inconvenience this has created. With that, we express our sincerest apologies," the statement read.
This announcement comes two days after the WVSU vowed to probe the allegations of a post circulating social media that claimed some test takers were able to obtain a copy of the admission exam in advance.
The viral post by CJ Gania Barnezo Arellano said that his sister, an applicant at the WVSU, learned that other examinees had already discovered the questions and the answer key to the admission test before taking it.
This year’s admission exam by the WVSU had a record 20,925 examinees, higher than last year’s 18,630 applicants.
WVSU is a public university in Iloilo City in the Western Visayas region that specializes in teacher education, nursing and medicine, with its main campus in La Paz having been designated by the Commission on Higher Education as a center of excellence in teacher education and center of development in nursing education.