A leading Maltese student organisation has urged students not to cheat after a faculty announced that a class would be automatically failed following the discovery of a cheating plot.

Studenti Demokristjani Maltin (SDM) said that while they’ll be “looking into this issue further” they “strongly” condemned cheating in all its forms and ways.

“Online examinations, take-home exams and other alternative methods have been put in place to ensure the health of all students. Therefore, it should be every student’s duty to abide by all regulations which the University puts up especially with regards to online tests and exams,” SDM said in a statement given by SDM vice-president Michela Pace.

Their statement comes after the Faculty of Economics, Management and Accountancy sent a letter to students saying they had become aware of a cheating plot and had “enough substantiated evidence of collusion in Test 1 and Test 2 for study unit EMA1008”.

“In fact, the Faculty is in possession of more than 43 screenshots from a Facebook Messenger Chat to substantiate the claim,” they told students in the email, leading to frustration and outrage amongst students who had not cheated but were being put in the same group as the others.

The unit, Quantitative Analysis for Business, is a maths heavy unit that focuses on quantitative analysis techniques such as linear algebra, differential calculus, linear programming, and optimisation techniques.