What happened
UNAM, Mexico's largest university, administered its entrance exam remotely for the first time this summer using AI-powered webcam proctoring. When results arrived, top scores surged dramatically—16.3% of test takers scored 100 or above (compared with 3.5% between 2021–2025), and 5.5% scored 110 or above (versus 0.9% historically). A commission of experts investigating the anomaly recommended a "control exam" administered in person; about 58,000 applicants—those admitted under this year's test plus everyone who would have qualified based on minimum passing scores since 2021—must now retake it.
Why it matters
The remote proctoring setup raised suspicions of widespread cheating, undermining confidence in the fairness of admissions to Mexico's premier university. The rector apologized to applicants who performed honestly, acknowledging they must prepare and test again despite doing nothing wrong. The university framed the in-person retake as "necessary to give certainty and guarantee equity in access." For students, this means additional weeks of study and exam stress; for UNAM, it signals that AI-supervised remote testing failed to maintain academic integrity at scale.
What to watch
The control exam details should appear soon, and classes are currently scheduled to begin on August 10—the university will need to move quickly unless it delays the academic calendar to accommodate the retesting process.
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UNAM's decision to conduct its entrance exam remotely for the first time this summer marked a significant operational shift for the institution. Nearly 160,000 applicants took the test between late May and early June using a lockdown browser and AI-powered webcam proctoring. However, the results immediately signaled something had gone wrong: the distribution of top scores departed sharply from historical norms. The jump from 3.5% to 16.3% of test takers scoring 100 or above—and from 0.9% to 5.5% at the 110-or-above threshold—was large enough to trigger investigations into possible cheating.
The university assembled a commission of experts to review the admissions process and its technical safeguards. Rather than attempt to validate or salvage the remote results, the commission recommended scrapping the remote exam's outcomes and requiring a second, in-person test. This decision affects not only the 58,000 applicants who would have been admitted under the problematic remote test, but also applicants going back to 2021—essentially those who would have qualified under the minimum passing thresholds historically established for each program. The university rector, while apologizing to honest applicants burdened with retesting, framed the control exam as essential to "give certainty and guarantee equity in access," signaling that institutional credibility depends on restoring confidence in the admissions system.
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