AI cheating in schools is real; did we have to kill the SBA?
CXC found 128 exam irregularities this year and, for the first time, some involved AI. Its response includes a much bigger move: most non-practical SBAs are going away in 2027, replaced by another written paper. One number is 128. The other is 118,000-plus students. That mismatch deserves more attention than it is getting.
AI cheating is real. So is the danger of designing an entire assessment system around the newest form of cheating you just discovered. CXC recorded 128 irregularities across a CSEC population above 118,000, then announced a structural change that will touch almost everybody.
Dr Nicole Manning, CXC's Director of Operations, put the number plainly at the results ceremony in Anguilla on 18 August. One hundred and twenty-eight irregularities this year, against 80 in 2025, 54 in 2024 and 36 in 2023. One hundred and six of this year's cases were at CSEC, up from 57. Twenty-two were at CAPE, which is down from 23.
Phones. Collusion. Unauthorised material. Then came the new child at the back of the class: AI.
Thirdly, use of unauthorised material and the new one on the block, AI misuse. We have never had this before. This is new.Dr Nicole Manning, Director of Operations, CXC, 18 August 2026
Candidates found guilty have grades cancelled or are disqualified. Manning said some students repeated the same misconduct across several different examinations.
Source: Dr Nicole Manning, CXC Director of Operations, regional results ceremony, 18 August 2026.
Irregularities tripled, from a base of 36
Both halves of that sentence matter, and regional commentary has mostly picked one.
Irregularities have gone 36, 54, 80, 128 across four sittings. That is a rise of more than three and a half times in three years, and no examining body should shrug at a curve like that.
Against a CSEC entry above 118,000, this year's 106 CSEC cases represent roughly one candidate in every 1,100. CXC has not published how many of the 128 involved AI specifically, which makes the size of the AI problem, as opposed to the devices and collusion problem, currently unknown from the public record.
That gap matters because a much larger change is being made partly on the strength of it.
| Measure | 2026 | Prior year | Scale |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total examination irregularities | 128 | 80 | Up 60% |
| CSEC irregularities | 106 | 57 | Up 86% |
| CAPE irregularities | 22 | 23 | Down slightly |
| CSEC candidates absent | 32,403 | Not stated | Cannot be graded |
| CAPE candidates absent | 3,534 | Not stated | Cannot be graded |
| Compassionate considerations | 359 | 449 | Down 20% |
Source: Dr Nicole Manning, CXC Director of Operations, regional results ceremony, Anguilla, 18 August 2026. Compassionate considerations for 2026 comprise 71 CAPE and 288 CSEC candidates, against 72 and 377 the previous year.
Nearly 36,000 registered candidates did not sit their examinations. That figure is 280 times the number of recorded irregularities, and it received a fraction of the attention.
Removing the SBA is a structural change, not a fix
From the May/June 2027 sitting, CXC is removing School Based Assessments from most non-practical subjects and replacing them with an additional examination, Paper 032. The SBA has been the component where a Caribbean student shows research, project work and sustained writing over months rather than over two hours in a hall.
Writing in the Vincentian newspaper Searchlight in July, critics of the change argued that the official justification is incomplete and that SBA integrity problems existed long before generative AI arrived. The same commentary pointed to CXC's January 2026 launch of digital hybrid examinations for CSEC mathematics and English A, which produced hours-long delays and student distress in Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago.
This Newsletter's position is narrower than either camp's. Replacing coursework with an examination does remove the AI question from that component, because a supervised hall is the one place a model cannot help. It also removes the only part of CSEC that rewards a student who works steadily for six months over one who performs on a single morning, and it does so for every candidate in the region on the strength of a number CXC has not published.
Three measures that keep the coursework
CXC has also adapted an international framework for responsible AI use in assessment. Good. That is the kind of boring, targeted fix worth exhausting before rebuilding the exam around the assumption that everybody is cheating.
Three measures used by examining bodies elsewhere sit between doing nothing and abolishing coursework: requiring drafts and version history with the submission, adding a short supervised oral defence of the SBA, and having candidates complete a portion of the writing in class under supervision. Each keeps the coursework and closes most of the gap.
The case for CXCAn examiner cannot verify what it cannot see
- The curve is steepIrregularities have gone 36, 54, 80, 128 in four years, and detection lags behind the tools.
- Detection does not workNo reliable AI text detector exists. An examining body cannot build a regional standard on software that produces false accusations.
- Fairness cuts both waysA student who wrote their own SBA is disadvantaged by every one that was generated, and CXC has to answer to them too.
- It kept the practicalsSubjects where the coursework is physical work retain their SBA, which suggests a targeted rather than blanket judgement.
The case againstThe evidence base has not been shown
- The AI share is unpublishedCXC gave a total of 128 irregularities without breaking out how many involved AI, while citing AI in the reasoning for a regional change.
- SBA problems predate AIPurchased and ghost-written coursework has been a known regional issue for years, which points at oversight rather than at chatbots.
- It penalises the steady studentCoursework is where candidates who work consistently but examine poorly earn their marks, and that group is not small.
- The delivery record is unevenThe January 2026 digital hybrid launch caused hours-long delays in Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago, which is a poor basis for confidence in a new paper.
Interpretation by the Caribbean AI Newsletter. CXC's stated reasoning is reported from its public statements and from regional coverage of the 2026 results release.
Four questions ministries should ask before 2027
CXC is not a weather system. Ministries fund it. They can ask questions.
How many of the 128 irregularities involved AI, by subject. What the international AI assessment framework CXC adapted actually says, and whether schools have received it. Whether draft submission, oral defence and supervised in-class writing were modelled as alternatives before removal was chosen. And what the projected effect of Paper 032 is on candidates who currently pass on coursework strength.
For schools, the issue is less philosophical. Students entering fourth form now will meet the new structure. Tell them early that the exam carries more weight. Do not let them discover the policy change when the timetable arrives.
Structure as announced by CXC. Confirm the position for individual subjects with your school.
Frequently asked questions
128 candidates broke rules. 35,937 did not show up. One of those numbers helped trigger a redesign of assessment. The other mostly became a statistic in a results speech.Caribbean AI Newsletter · The Policy Desk, 19 August 2026
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