That does seem to depend on countries and universities.

I do have to say I was appalled by some of the tests I had as an exchange student in the US (will not name the Uni in question but ranked around 60 in us rank). I remember a computer graphics test where a lot of questions were of the type "Which companies created the consortium maintaining the opengl specification?"... it was fully possible to obtain a passing grade just by rote memorization of facts. So I have no trouble believing that in the US it's possible in some unis to get a software engineering degree without understanding or critical thining

> a lot of grades are composed of tests, not projects

(Take home) projects are easier than ever thanks to AI. In the past, you at least had to track down some person to do the work for you.