Academic Dishonesty (Cheating)

[Twilight_guy]

No. Professors should not announce to the class a student has cheated, that's a major no-no and possibly illegal. In addition making kids hate each other will get you fired. The correct way to deal with cheating students is that if they cheat for something major, you give them an F and do everything in your power to get them expelled. Don't be mean about it and don't treat it like a punishment, just lay it out as the flat truth, cheat and you will be forced to try and expel their ass, like a natural reflex. If they cheat on something minor then give them a zero and if they continue to do then do as above. Tell them that cheating will not be tolerated and tell them to not even try it. Students will still do it but you will able to come down like hammer in the right way if you find out.

 

[Shadowkire]

Or... how about employers actually try interviewing and testing potential employees. That would eliminate the possibility of a cheater getting rewarded for taking the easy way out and would shut your dad up about the idiots who are hired to work with him.

 

[Kolby Jack]

I've heard several times in the Navy that "if you ain't cheating, you ain't trying." Now, this is not official policy, obviously, but most senior Navy personnel I've known at least aren't stupid enough to write off all cheating as utterly reprehensible and deserving of immediate, harsh disciplinary action. And of course, there are some things you just don't cheat on because the potential cost is too high.

There are smart cheaters and dumb cheaters. Smart ones realize that cheating is a temporary solution and endeavor to improve in the area they are forced to cheat in so they don't run the risk of repeat offenses. Dumb ones just copy answers without thought and in the end almost always get caught eventually.

 

[infinity^infinity]

In the analogy I was not placing myself as the scientist, that was the class as a whole. Yes, you can choose the size of the group you are studying but that decision can only be made prior to the beginning of the experiment, and cannot be changed after the experiment has been completed. Also, if I want to know how well my class is understanding the material, by cutting the group down of which I take my average the potential error increases; and in a setting where I can easily obtain information from every member of the group, by reducing the size of the group that I actually take information from I am being irresponsible and not covering my bases.

Also, the individual achievements of scientists can, in a way, be effected by the institution they are from. An institution's reputation is made up of the reputations of every member of that institution. By simple math if even one researcher loses their credibility the gross credibility of the institute is decreased.

 

[DudeistBelieve]

Choice B: The student that cheats has to come up to the front of the classroom, rip up their test, announce to the class that they cheated, and everyone must take a re-take. In this option the student that cheated can get no higher than a 70%.

I'd withdraw from your class the first time that happened and then spread the word to everyone I know that you do that. As for why, it's because I don't have to take that shit. I don't cheat, on anything. I study and do my work, and I don't enjoy doing it twice. Especially if it's because some fuck nuts decided to cheat and gets caught. I pay my tuition to be taught, not take shit from a professor who's overzealous with the cheating policy. It's not my concern nor should it be that someone else is cheating. My grade is my responsibility, if someone wants to skate through a class cheating I don't give a rat's ass. It's not a competition, I'd be a fool to think it matters at all what the grade is of the guy sitting next to me.

So yeah I say choice A, the kid made their choice so let them stew in the mess they made. With option B I'd promptly tell you to fuck off and you'd never see me in your class again. Plus I'd make sure to ruin your reputation amongst the students, though you wouldn't need just me to do that. I guarantee all the other kids in the class who weren't cheating will be doing that as well through simple word of mouth.

Here here sir, my views on college in general match yours. I'm very sick and tired of pretentious fucking profs.

 

[The_Evermind]

My main problem with option B is that classes need as much time as they can get, are you really going to throw away all of the time not only for your students, studying and retaking the test but also yourself, grading may be fairly quick if it is just a scantron but are you going to make an entirely new test just because one of your students cheated?

My economics teacher had an interesting way of dealing with cheating. On the day of the first test after all of the papers were passed out he stood up pointed behind us and and said (and this was in a 100+ person class) "You see those lights back there? Those are cameras. And if we catch you cheating we aren't going to call the administration or anything like that. We will just take you outside and kick your ass." He was just joking of course (most likely) but it was a lighthearted reminder to every person in the class that cheating was serious business and would not be tolerated.

 

[Naeo]

Most of the time the university itself deals with honor code/cheating infractions on its own. My university certainly does--a professor notifies the Honor Council, a student body who deals with matters of honor code violations, and the council takes everything from there and the professor doesn't have to worry about it at all.

 

[KeyMaster45]

As for student reputation goes; if my reputation is solely decided upon the basis that I have morals and I don't tolerate cheating in any form, then I could care less about what the students think of me. I think what makes a good teacher is their ability to teach the students so they understand and help in their intellectual growth, and any student who decides that a teacher is "bad" because of the teacher's cavalierity on cheating then it is the student who is of poor quality.

It's not that you enforce a cheating policy that would give you the bad rep, it's that you enforce a really shitty cheating policy that punishes the group for the crimes of one individual on the assumption that the existence of one means the existence of untold others. Like I said, if someone is cheating that's not my problem, it's theirs. If they get caught it should be between you and them. Not you, them, and everyone else in the class. I'm all for punishing cheaters, cheating makes no sense in my book and it seems to require more effort than actually studying or doing the work.

The flaw in your logic with option B is that it assumes everyone is guilty on the basis of one person. People don't appreciate being unjustly punished, regardless of how good a teacher you actually are. It would be your hamfisted methods for dealing with cheating that would garner you a bad reputation, not that students would be upset it's harder for them to cheat in your class. Students who cheat already don't care, your policy will mean nothing to them since they already have the bravado to think they're above actually learning the material. Your policy would instead inflict undue duress on students, like myself, who don't cheat and quite frankly piss us off. It punishes the wrong group of people, and it's unfortunately the group of people who appreciate that you're up at the board teaching.

You want to send a message that you don't tolerate cheating? Ruin the kids that actually do, the rest of us who don't would appreciate if we could go about our semester in your class unhindered by their stupidity. Kids who actually study already go through enough anxiety the night before a test, and you want to have a cheating policy that could potentially put them through that anxiety twice? Thanks but no thanks dude, I'll gladly take the course next semester with someone else.

 

[Berenzen]

As you probably know, choice A is the choice that is the university rule. You are bound by contract to always follow that rule, as are your students. So yes, choice A is the choice that you should go with. Academic Dishonesty is the worst crime in the academic world and should be treated as such by ALL professors. Just this year, my university's dean of Medicine was found guilty of plagiarism, and he was fired from the university and essentially blacklisted across the academic world. You know what he copied? A graduation speech. Not a paper, or an idea, but a graduation speech, because it was plagiarized right from the Harvard graduation speech given the year before.

And as you yourself said, it is draconian to use choice B. If a scientific journal used the same idea, then essentially they would force every author to not only resubmit, but rewrite the entire paper, costing hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of dollars in time lost. The journal would fold immediately.

Oh, and cheaters never get 4.0s, I can guarantee you that. They're typically the ones just trying to squeeze out a passing grade so they can go onto the next year. The guy/gal that's 'cruising' along with a GPA of 4.0, is probably doing a hell of a lot more work than you think (s)he is, and they're probably pretty damned smart.

As for your father's story, no one has a clue about what to do on their first day, no matter how trained they are. They're in an entirely different environment, outside of their comfort zone, most likely using entirely different procedures than how they're used to, and they know that they're on a tight line and if they screw up, they could get fired. Not to mention, most of what you learn in university is either false or glazed over, unless you have done large amounts of research on that topic.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

Well, your choices are both absolutely insane. How about you just make them fail that task, you know, like a sane person would?

 

[infinity^infinity]

As for student reputation goes; if my reputation is solely decided upon the basis that I have morals and I don't tolerate cheating in any form, then I could care less about what the students think of me. I think what makes a good teacher is their ability to teach the students so they understand and help in their intellectual growth, and any student who decides that a teacher is "bad" because of the teacher's cavalierity on cheating then it is the student who is of poor quality.

It's not that you enforce a cheating policy that would give you the bad rep, it's that you enforce a really shitty cheating policy that punishes the group for the crimes of one individual on the assumption that the existence of one means the existence of untold others. Like I said, if someone is cheating that's not my problem, it's theirs. If they get caught it should be between you and them. Not you, them, and everyone else in the class. I'm all for punishing cheaters, cheating makes no sense in my book and it seems to require more effort than actually studying or doing the work.

The flaw in your logic with option B is that it assumes everyone is guilty on the basis of one person. People don't appreciate being unjustly punished, regardless of how good a teacher you actually are. It would be your hamfisted methods for dealing with cheating that would garner you a bad reputation, not that students would be upset it's harder for them to cheat in your class. Students who cheat already don't care, your policy will mean nothing to them since they already have the bravado to think they're above actually learning the material. Your policy would instead inflict undue duress on students, like myself, who don't cheat and quite frankly piss us off. It punishes the wrong group of people, and it's unfortunately the group of people who appreciate that you're up at the board teaching.

You want to send a message that you don't tolerate cheating? Ruin the kids that actually do, the rest of us who don't would appreciate if we could go about our semester in your class unhindered by their stupidity. Kids who actually study already go through enough anxiety the night before a test, and you want to have a cheating policy that could potentially put them through that anxiety twice? Thanks but no thank dude, I'll gladly take the course next semester with someone else.

I see what you are getting at, and I understand. I suffered from test anxiety for a good deal of time and I myself would no want this to ever happen to me. But, I think there is the possibility that if I make the punishment incredibly severe than no one will do it. People are saying that the contempt provided by the cheater's peers would have no affect on the cheater because there is no social network inbetween them. I don't think this is true; I have been to two colleges in my life; one was a community college were I commuted to class, and an actual university were I stayed in a dorm on campus. And I have to say even in the community college there was a strong connection between my peers and I. It was almost a certainty that you would have another class with at least one person in your class the prior semester. I am hoping that the social network would prevent them from cheating since it is now apparently clear that their actions will cause harm to people other than themselves. Mostly however, I feel that if I teach the best that I can and people are still cheating I feel as if that reflects on me and my ability to teach, almost as if I did not get to that one person; because at the end of the day the real reason I want to be a professor is so I can share the wonder and excitement that my field has given me since I was a kid.

 

[infinity^infinity]

Being sane is overrated, plus I am bringing back the whole "madscientist" image.

 

[emeraldrafael]

I cant imagine B being a very viable option once students hwo were confident in their abilities and already had completed the exam with an acceptable grade (to them) having to come back and retake the test again, only differently.

Plus you're in effect delaying the test (if your university runs like mine, you have time limits on classes) to another day, giving the student who cheated more time to study.

...

Personally, i feel students who cheat should be given a failing grade on the assignment they cheated on as a first offense punishment, then after that you fail them from the class. It teachers a lesson and gives them the opportunity to look at what they did and make the moral grown up decision of do I do it again and chance it, or do I just buckle down and study.

 

[Therumancer]

Well, while degrees are rapidly becoming little more than pieces of paper due to everyone having them, I think this is a big deal.

People tend to cheat in school because good grades open doors for them down the road, and the people doing it frequently feel they HAVE to cheat in order to get ahead. Of course this winds up destroying the entire foundation of our society with things being based on competition.

A guy who cheats on his schoolwork isn't committing a victimless crime, he's stealing a future from those legitimatly competing. What's more with people cheating to raise their grades it inflates the number of people with "perfect" scores and makes it that much more difficult for people who don't have perfect scores. Right now due to cheating I think having that 4.0 GPA is becoming such a requirement to get ahead because so many people manage to get them nowadays that it's becoming expected.

 

[chowderface]

Option B is a terrible idea. Go with C:

C starts like option B, in that if you catch a cheater, everyone has to retake the test. BUT, if someone cheats, and someone else snitches, the snitch and anyone they'll vouch for as co-snitching gets off. Also, innocent people who are not vouchsafed as co-snitching are subtly encouraged to kneecap cheaters after having been made to retake their test.

 

[A Free Man]

Arghh I hate teachers that have your way of thinking. Why on Earth would you want to punish students for having dumb people in their class? If anything this would just make them resent you and the person who was cheating, who you so conveniently showed to the entire class. I think a much more fair way is to only punish the person cheating and if they did so knowingly the person who helped them cheat. That being said, if someone is stupid enough to cheat then they obviously don't care too much about the class and I wouldn't think being kicked out was too harsh. I'm sure people will have a thousand excuses but when it comes down to it, 99% of the time the reason they cheated will come down to laziness or being unorganised both traits that aren't going to get you anywhere in a working environment and shouldn't be tolerated in university.

 

[Yellowbeard]

But, I think there is the possibility that if I make the punishment incredibly severe than no one will do it.

That never works. The existing punishment is appropriate and you have to catch them for it to matter, anyway.

I am hoping that the social network would prevent them from cheating since it is now apparently clear that their actions will cause harm to people other than themselves.

Doesn't change a thing because students are not close friends with everyone in any class, nor indeed with most of them. Some people will have no friends in that class. The dynamic is the same, regardless. If they've got close friends, they'll cheat together. Besides, your draconian idea won't get any respect, no one will take it seriously, and because of that if you made good on your promise they would blame YOU for being needlessly cruel. I sure hope this alleged course doesn't have grad students doing the marking.

Mostly however, I feel that if I teach the best that I can and people are still cheating I feel as if that reflects on me and my ability to teach, almost as if I did not get to that one person; because at the end of the day the real reason I want to be a professor is so I can share the wonder and excitement that my field has given me since I was a kid.

Try to share less of the naïveté, though.

 

[Mylinkay Asdara]

You're talking about cheating on a test, sharing homework answers, copying papers - what exactly? Or are you including using something from a paper that student already wrote and all the minor instances under the rule as well?

I'm against academic dishonesty in a big way - but there are degrees and certain problems with enforceability for many of the minor ones.

Also... there's a bit of that "innocent until proven guilty" problem - It's entirely possible for a student to write almost the same thing as another student writing about the same topic as someone they've no awareness of simply by chance over a big enough group of people.

I think we're all better off encouraging an environment where the honor system is actually upheld. Enforcement - more and harder - isn't always the answer. I've been watching the Ken Burn's new documentary on Prohibition and that's enough to have convinced me of that little tidbit.

I hope that I will be teaching physics so there probably won't be many papers involved. I am mainly concerned about tests because homework is very hard to enforce, and the way I see it, you can do your own work on the homework which will lead to a better understanding of the material. Or, you can cheat on the homework and get nothing from it and be unprepared for the test hurting yourself in the long run.

Since you're only concerned with actual test taking cheating - why not channel your energy into making anti-cheating screens to prevent it from ever happening in the first place, rather than coming up with inventive punishment structures? It might save you a lot of gray hairs.

 

[Togs]

Gotta say OP every time you post you paint an unfavourable picture of yourself.

Not knowing anything by the time you graduate is not a sign of cheating- I can barely remember anything from my degree but I still graduated and certainly didnt cheat.

And yes punishing people for others mistakes is Draconian.

 

[b3nn3tt]

Yeh, I'm with everyone else who thinks that Option B is a terrible idea. From the sounds of the OP your only justification for making the whole class retake a test is 'there might be other cheaters.' Also, many people in the class would have spent days preparing for a test, it hardly seems fair to make them go through the same thing again just because somebody else in the class cheated. Also, as people have pointed out, the class is not a singular unit, there is no reason why punishing everyone would have any impact on the person who actualy cheated.

Seriously, terrible idea. Please, if you do become a lecturer, don't ever implement this system in any of your classes.