A generation of Cheaters

[scoutldr]

Center looks at academic integrity ills

By Monica Rozenfeld\Correspondent

Published: 10/24/05

 

For the last 15 years, Don McCabe has looked into what influences a student to peek over at the test of the person next to them or to pass off an internet-purchased essay as their own. McCabe is a professor of Management and Global Business at the University, and also the founding president of the Center for Academic Integrity at Duke University. His research in the past 15 years on cheating has included over 140 colleges and universities in both the United States and Canada, surveying over 100,000 students. Aside from college-level cheating, he has focused on high school students as well. According to his research, high school students report a higher level of cheating than college-level students. Does this mean that cheating originates at a younger age and the habit transfers over to college? "It often does originate at younger levels but also can be very situational so that there are some students who may well cheat in college for the first time," McCabe said. Data show that 75 percent of the 4,500 high school students surveyed engage in serious cheating, according to a national survey by the Rutgers Management Education Center. "There are many reasons different students cheat," McCabe said. "Time pressures, competitiveness, panic, a way of life." In a CNN article, "Survey: Many students say cheating's OK," students respond to McCabe's findings. One student, Alice Newhall who attends a top school in northern Virginia, said the pressure to do well academically and compete for good colleges has made cheating a way to survive high school. "What's important is getting ahead," Newhall said. "The better you do, that's what shows. It's not how moral you were in getting there." And this mentality attributes morality to the real world as well. Aside from academic pressure, the most common response on why students cheat is due to the corruption of the adult world they see, including politicians and celebrities. "I think kids today are looking to adults and society for a moral compass and when they see the behavior occurring there, they don't understand why they should be held to a higher standard," McCabe said in the CNN article. There are many reasons why students do cheat, and knowing or not knowing possible consequences they still continue, but why does this not stop them? "It depends on the student," McCabe said. "Some obviously think they won't be caught. Some really don't care because they feel the reward outweighs the risk, especially if penalties [at their school] aren't severe. " "Some simply panic and others simply do not think about the consequences assuming somehow they'll get off if they're caught," he said.(This message has been edited by scoutldr)

[SemperParatus]

I will come clean here...afterall only a few of you actually know me.

 

I cheated once.

 

It was 1983, I was a junior in college taking Dr. Patterson's Theology Class. Dr. Patterson had had a stroke a few years prior but due to the wonders of tenure, he continued to teach even though he was kind of out of it. The mid-term was a one-on-one oral examination with Dr. Patterson in his office. I was scheduled for Monday AM, we talked for a couple of hours (it was more like a conversation with my aged grandfather, then a test) and I got my A.

 

The cheating part came on Tuesday, when I returned to take the oral examination posing as a classmate...Todd M...a 6'6" African-American basketball player (I am not any of those things). Todd offered me a $100 to do it (I think some booster was giving him cash) and I needed some beer money for the coming week, so what the heck, we thought we could pull it off giving the professor's faculties. Sure enough, Dr. Patterson welcomed me into his office, "Todd, so glad to see you..." and we spent a couple of hours talking about the transcendent nature of God's forgiveness.

 

After sobering up a little, the guilt and irony of the situation started to sink in. Todd and I both decided to go to the dean to confess our transgressions and take our medicine. Lucky for us, both the dean and Dr. Patterson found the story rather humorous and our 'punishment' was simply to write an extra term paper.

 

We definitely tasted some forgiveness that day.

[Prairie_Scouter]

I doubt a lot of this. 4500 students in a study is basically a statistically insignificant number relative to the total number of students in high school. If 75% of students in high school were cheating, the educational system would be collapsing. And, the teachers would have to be totally inept to not see the situation. My guess is that the questions asked in the study led to these kinds of numbers.

 

Second, although there are those who would like to blame the ills of the world on the perceived morally bankrupt lifestyle of politicians and celebrities, this is largely a fiction created by media, and exaserbated by those who would like to take advantage of such a fiction. The vast majority of politicians are hard-working, well-meaning public servants, with the best interests of their consituents in mind. We only hear about the very, very small number of those people, and they are invariably in the very small number who have managed to so something less than wise. The same is true of celebrities (and I assume by this they mean show business people). The celebrities who make the media are the ones that everyone sees. But, for every whatshername Hilton doing whatever silly thing she's doing, there are a greater number of people like Richard Dean Anderson, and others, who are doing good works protecting the environment or getting involved in other political causes in a more or less quiet way.

 

 

[hops_scout]

Any high school student or teacher can tell you cheating goes on--whether they get caught or not is hard to say. A lot of cheating occurs on homework. I do not allow people to copy my work and I do not copy others' work, but I know that a lot of people do allow it. In our school, cheating would be quite possible during tests and quizzes. Why? Because our school population includes 950 teenagers and the school building was designed for 650. Our school is cramped. Thirty students in one class that are relatively small classrooms it's hard sometimes not to "catch a glance" of somebody's paper. I will truthfully say that I have been able to look at another's paper, but I do not look hard enough to read them because I hate cheaters.

 

Sorry to get offtopic a bit there, but hopefully this could be seen as one more reason we need a new school. Hopefully, they'll have one by 2009.

[acco40]

Our culture (USA) rewards results. Athletics are a big influence. Also, our culture emphasizes money. How one achieves their "success", fame or money falls a distant second to the success, fame and money. And we wonder why our youth cheat?

 

Homework - I'm a practicing engineer. I found that in high school and college we regularly shared homework assignments that involved problem solving. We learned from those experiences and in fact some teachers encourage such collaboration. If a fellow student just took and didn't give, he was quickly exorcised from our circle. Now, for my other classes (non-problem solving) I found that homework was more of a solitary endeavor.

[scoutldr]

Once at a Troop meeting, I overheard some of our scouts discussing the merits of one MP3 player over another. Acting dumb, I asked, "how do you get the music onto those things." "Oh, you just download songs from the internet." "For free," I asked feigning incredulity. "Sure." was the reply. "Aren't there copyright laws against stealing someone else's work?" I asked. "Aw, everyone does it. If it was illegal, it wouldn't be on the internet"

 

My point is, today's kids have no problem swearing an oath to be Trustworthy, and at the same time freely ripping CDs and MP3s and trading them around, or cheating on an exam or plagiarizing a paper off the internet. They just don't make the connection.

 

Our challenge is large!

[packsaddle]

A sample with an 'n' of 4500 is adequate if the sampling was completed in a statistically appropriate manner. Actually, for most purposes, a sample of approximately 1000 is adequate. The key is the sampling strategy. And I suspect the study did a fair amount of subsampling from the original 4500 although I am not familiar with it.

 

And I believe that every generation is confronted with the temptation to cheat. The tools are just more sophisticated these days and educators sometimes don't match it with their personal skill level.

 

I can't speak for high school but in my classes I inform them that I don't give them a grade. They earn whatever they earn. At the same time, I inform them that I am not there to punish them with hard work but rather to give them an opportunity to learn. And that involves hard work. I do sometimes (gleefully) let them choose whether I give 'open book' rather than 'closed book' exams. And sometimes whether 'multiple choice' as opposed to written answers and problem solving. Their decision-making process is interesting to watch. But the choice always causes some worried looks. Small pleasures, perhaps, but pleasures nevertheless.

 

So far, I have only detected one case of cheating ('F' in the course and suspension for the remainder of the year). They didn't return to this school.

 

There are excellent resources available to detect cheating, especially plagiarism. However, if I give out a problem set or a written homework assignment, I require all the work and all the prose to be hand written. And that is fairly hard to fake. The subsequent exam will determine how much they actually learned from the exercise.