Cheating on exams in college

[Carlito]

Hi,

I was wondering what your views would be on the subject of cheating during exams or presenting work of others as your own (plagiarism) during your college years. This came about when talking to fellow foreign engineers, who have told me, that in some of their home countries, cheating, or paying the instructor for passing grade is the norm for some rather the exception. The reason cited most often is that it is impossible to learn the material, as the general level of education is way higher than at US institutions. (This view seems to be universal - is our system really so weak?)

To add to that, some countries do not have an equivalent to the US PE, and upon graduation, one already becomes a fully privileged PE in their county (US equivalent). This issue in particular is obviously troubling, for obvious reasons. You may think it does not concern you - but if you like to travel abroad, you begin to wonder...

Myself, having been educated in the US, did not recall witnessing a case of cheating during the exams – but was I the exception from the rule? What has been your experience – both US and foreign educated individuals? It will be interesting to hear your voices.

Regards.

 

[C-Dog]

Those who cheat only cheat themselves. When I was an undergrad (frosh and Soph years) I witnessed people cheating on exams. These were the part of the 60% that transfered to business majors. I also witnessed people (two in 5 years) getting caught. I know they failed the course, don't know what else happened. As an upperclassman and in grad school, I did not witness any cheating.

In the classes I teach now, if I find someone cheating, they fail the class and I report them to the department head for further action. Luckily I have not had to do that.

 

[maryannette]

My opinion is that cheating should be punished severely. I think cheating has always been around, but I think it is more widespread in the U.S. now than we want to acknowledge. I heard a report recently that some universities (Wake Forest is the most well-known) have stopped requiring any standardized test (SAT or ACT) for admission. I'm in favor of standardized tests because they are more controlled and less prone to cheating. I also agree that exams should be required for PE license and other professional licenses. I know of many students who made straight A's in high school, yet could not score 1000 on SAT (old 1600 system) even after specialized tutoring. That tells me that the straight A's were not legitimate. I also know of people who falsified information on resumes (had a PE license when they didn't). That's just more cheating.

Okay, now that I've got that out, let me say that I despise cheating.

 

[ODB_PE]

In graduate school my program was about 2/3rds foreign. At least on homeworks, those guys (and gals) stuck together. I would bust my ass and only get partial credit. Meanwhile, most of the class was getting perfect scores. It was quite apparent something was going on, and then I heard that the perfect scores were a result of knowing the grader, and/or having all of the solutions banked.

Curiously my homework scores were WAY below average, while my exam scores were well above average. I'm guessing because the professors wrote new exams and graded them themselves. I'm also guessing the professors knew about the homework sharing, but knew that the exams would take care of things.

There is no place for cheaters in any academic program, or anywhere else. One way or another the honest people end up paying the price.

 

[Casey]

Pretty much everyone at my school did the "homework sharing"... It wasn't just the foreign students... But when assignments only counted for no more than 10% of your final grade, it was the exams that sorted out the people that actually learned their stuff and those that were riding somone else's coat tails.

As for cheating on the exam, I had never seen that personally... But I believe there were a few cases at my school where other engineering students in different classes were caught and disciplined (I don't remember the punishment)...

I don't agree with cheating and I hope that they will get their due sooner than later....

As for places that say it is the norm to cheat and to pay for your marks... Well that may be the norm, but that does not make it ethical.

 

[Vinsanity]

For me personally, I dont mind cheating, if they are not caught, if I caught them, no questions asked I have failed all of them. I use to teach in the university in my homeland for eight years in BS Civil Engineering. It is the students who will later pay the price, knowledge not learnt well is what they get. After they graduate they are required to write down 16 hrs for Engineering board licensure exams to get valid engineering license, and for most cheaters they will surely flank on this exam and the pass mark is pretty high at 70%.

 

[ODB_PE]

Pretty much everyone at my school did the "homework sharing"... It wasn't just the foreign students... But when assignments only counted for no more than 10% of your final grade, it was the exams that sorted out the people that actually learned their stuff and those that were riding somone else's coat tails.

I didn't necessarily mean to single out foreign students, but at least in the first year they seemed to have a much more active "network" - we jokingly referred to them as the mafia. None of my few friends had access to the solutions, but then I was the old guy so everybody probably thought I was a narc.

Homework only 10% I could handle, but in most of my classes homework was in the 25% range.

 

[Vinsanity]

I didn't necessarily mean to single out foreign students, but at least in the first year they seemed to have a much more active "network" - we jokingly referred to them as the mafia. None of my few friends had access to the solutions, but then I was the old guy so everybody probably thought I was a narc.
Homework only 10% I could handle, but in most of my classes homework was in the 25% range.

When i was teaching in the university, I dont give homeworks, my grading system was only based on exams, that's it , I dont care if students wont attend my class, my strategy was if, you can pass my exams you will pass, if not you will fail.

Giving homeworks will encourage copying and not understanding the content at all.

 

[IlPadrino]

Pretty much everyone at my school did the "homework sharing"...

I've got no problem with sharing homework... Like already mentioned, it's easy to see what's going on when some do great on homework and poor on exams while others do poor on homework and great on exams.

Exam cheating is different. There should be no tolerance and the penalty swift (like automatic failure).

 

[Dexman1349]

The fraternity I belong to has a large, extensive library dedicated to the classes at school. It had notebooks dedicated to each individual class/teacher combo that someone had attended and contained copies of the exams offered (if they were allowed to keep a copy) and the homework/notes. With this information it was easy to determine which professors re-used homework assignments, test questions, etc. However most professors were savvy to this and would adjust their class each semester so that the old information could still be used, but only as a study guide. Most of the lab books were used simply to help with formatting / administrative type "sharing" that was re-used every class.

As far as full blown cheating ("Hey, what you get for #2?"), I never saw it occur through the 5 years I was at school. That's not to say it never happened, I just never saw it.

I agree with all of the above posts in that cheating only hurts yourself. When the exams really matter (the FE, PE, SE), if you don't know the info you're screwed.

 

[squishles10]

Vandy has an honor code- you have to sign the front of your exams saying you won't cheat and you'll report someone else if they do. There was a huge scandel my freshman year with people copying temp files in the computer lab, but then they'd kick out the people who's work was copied not the ones who copied it. It was very political and frankly disheartening. I think it happens everywhere though. I never "copied" homework, but I got coached through a few, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to do it. I don't consider that cheating though, since homework is supposed to be practice.

 

[Dleg]

I knew a few guys in college who were "cheating" on homework, but I never saw any cheating on exams. Perhaps I was just oblivious.

The best teacher I had in college was the guy who taught the freshman design class and senior level "instrumentation". You could get your grades the standard way (homework and exams), or by doing well on the class design projects. In freshman year it was a pole-climbing machine race, and in the senior class, it was programming a robotic arm (sort of) to transfer a certain number of ball bearings in as short a time as possible. If you could win those contests, or otherwise get an 'A' on the project, your previous grades didn't matter, and you didn't have to take the final exam - you got an 'A' in the class.

It was on the ball-bearing robot contest that I first ever suspected some "collaboration" among certain teams, who had what appeared to be absolutely brilliant solutions, but I learned later that they had accessed info (similar to the fraternity library mentioned above) from previous classes, and already knew the best solutions to try. No original thought. Nowadays, with the internet, I would almost expect that as a requirement - look up what everyone else before you has done - but his was in the days before the internet, and we were supposed to work it out on our own. (I'm proud to say I got one of the "other" A's on both projects, apparently by succeeding with our own original designs, though not winning the contest. We were also very clever in our write up, extolling the virtues of our design "can carry heavy loads, 100% reliable compared to the other teams, etc.)

But anyway, it doesn't surprise me to hear that paying for grades is common in some countries, just as paying bribes for everything else is common in those countries. But certainly not all countries.

 

[Vinsanity]

I knew a few guys in college who were "cheating" on homework, but I never saw any cheating on exams. Perhaps I was just oblivious.
The best teacher I had in college was the guy who taught the freshman design class and senior level "instrumentation". You could get your grades the standard way (homework and exams), or by doing well on the class design projects. In freshman year it was a pole-climbing machine race, and in the senior class, it was programming a robotic arm (sort of) to transfer a certain number of ball bearings in as short a time as possible. If you could win those contests, or otherwise get an 'A' on the project, your previous grades didn't matter, and you didn't have to take the final exam - you got an 'A' in the class.

It was on the ball-bearing robot contest that I first ever suspected some "collaboration" among certain teams, who had what appeared to be absolutely brilliant solutions, but I learned later that they had accessed info (similar to the fraternity library mentioned above) from previous classes, and already knew the best solutions to try. No original thought. Nowadays, with the internet, I would almost expect that as a requirement - look up what everyone else before you has done - but his was in the days before the internet, and we were supposed to work it out on our own. (I'm proud to say I got one of the "other" A's on both projects, apparently by succeeding with our own original designs, though not winning the contest. We were also very clever in our write up, extolling the virtues of our design "can carry heavy loads, 100% reliable compared to the other teams, etc.)

But anyway, it doesn't surprise me to hear that paying for grades is common in some countries, just as paying bribes for everything else is common in those countries. But certainly not all countries.

On the issue about projects and group project performances, I wouldnt give high grades and the issue here is, most "top students" will work on it and other team members will basically just go with the flow not doing anything or not participating at all, as far as I am concerened i wont allow this, it is better to be have it done individually, and you will see better results. students that doenst know anything will surely won't come up good on this, and this system is fair.

 

[EM_PS]

For my recent collegiate escapade, there was rampant homework sharing; unfortunately it went to the point of "can I get a copy of that mathcad / matlab / excel file"? Lot of people seemed content to only earn 1/3 of their degree.

Would programming a TI86 w/ equations / derivatives / integrals be considered cheating? :dunno: Some profs were ok about an index card w/ pertinent formulas for exams (akin to the FS / FE exam ref manuals), but many would have none of that - so yeah, i did plug some of the pertinent formulas in to 'assist' in exams, but never thought it to be cheating -

Oh yeah, Valparaiso & Hope College both had the honor code thing as Squishles had mentioned - my last school did not

 

[engineergurl]

The school I got my BS at had a store in the common area run by the student government, you could donate copies of your old tests and homework and notebooks, and then anyone could go into the store and pay to photocopy them. If the professors didn't want to allow their stuff in there, then they went and took it out, but a lot of them had the attitude, I change the tests and it's practice work if they work through the problems. My calc professor always left the problems the same, BUT changed the numbers, so you could work the problems and know what you were doing, but you still had to figure out the actual problem.

I guess what I'm saying is that using your resources isn't cheating in my opinion as long as you are using them to learn. But what's the point if you don't bother to actually try to understand the stuff? You could get a piece of paper saying you learned but the first time you had to use the knowledge in the real world, you wouldn't have a clue and your boss would eventually figure it out. That makes you, your school and your teachers look bad and sets it up for everyone to fail in the end.

With internet classes these days, a lot is going to be changing. You are giving up contact with other students, the professor, past students, etc etc etc. Yeah, you might be able to manage a few papers, but most exams are proctored so you have to take them for real.

There will always be dishonest people, but most people are ethical (or so I like to think) and if they aren't it will bite them eventually.

 

[benbo]

For my recent collegiate escapade, there was rampant homework sharing; unfortunately it went to the point of "can I get a copy of that mathcad / matlab / excel file"? Lot of people seemed content to only earn 1/3 of their degree.Would programming a TI86 w/ equations / derivatives / integrals be considered cheating? :dunno: Some profs were ok about an index card w/ pertinent formulas for exams (akin to the FS / FE exam ref manuals), but many would have none of that - so yeah, i did plug some of the pertinent formulas in to 'assist' in exams, but never thought it to be cheating -

Oh yeah, Valparaiso & Hope College both had the honor code thing as Squishles had mentioned - my last school did not

I don't know if this would be considered cheating, but that's pretty radical that they wouldn't allow a sheet of notes. I don't think I took a class in my EE program that didn't allow you a sheet of notes. Unfortuneately, it didn't help much. I could have had a full library and still not been able to solve half the problems they gave us.

 

[Dleg]

^That reminds me of freshman physics. I think by Physics II we were allowed two sheets of notes, but it was still brutally tough. We had a Chinese professor who was a brilliant researcher, apparently, but a terrible teacher. Everyone I knew who passed ended up going to tutoring sessions put on by sympathetic grad students.

 

[Casey]

For my recent collegiate escapade, there was rampant homework sharing; unfortunately it went to the point of "can I get a copy of that mathcad / matlab / excel file"? Lot of people seemed content to only earn 1/3 of their degree.Would programming a TI86 w/ equations / derivatives / integrals be considered cheating? :dunno: Some profs were ok about an index card w/ pertinent formulas for exams (akin to the FS / FE exam ref manuals), but many would have none of that - so yeah, i did plug some of the pertinent formulas in to 'assist' in exams, but never thought it to be cheating -

For all my calculus courses no calculators were allowed on the exam (you don't need a calculator to do most calculus anyways)....

But for all exams that did require a calculator, the faculty of engineering (similar to the NCEES) had their set of approved calculators to be used on exams. And none of them allowed you to store any functions...

Most courses permitted you to bring on a "cheat sheet", which you could put anything you wanted on it as long as it was in your own handwriting. Luckily I can write test at 1/16th so I never filled up my sheets completely. I always had some room left over.

Other classes provided the cheat sheet for you or were open book.

 

[Capt Worley PE]

One physics class I had, the professor stationed TAs outside the entrances and cleared all the calculators memory before they'd let you in.

Most class I had allowed one 'cheat sheet' to use on the test. The idea was that in the real world you'd have access to the formulas anyway.

 

[maryannette]

So ... if you use SparkNotes, are you cheating? I thought it was a good thing for engineering students who really don't need to "waste" time reading literature. But, if you are a Lit major, should SparkNotes be considered cheating?

Just wanted to throw some fuel on the fire.