Why Do Students in America Cheat?
What drives you to cheat on in-class assignments, homework assignments, tests, quizzes, and copy and paste documents from internet websites? Is it because there is too much pressure put on you to receive good grades, play a sport, and volunteer in community activities? In actuality, to be a successful student in the educational system today, you must be able to endure the pressure to achieve in and out of a classroom setting.
Student cheating is not just a past generation phenomenon. It has continued into the new generation, but is now worse than before. Statistics show that between 75 and 98 percent of college students surveyed over the past years admitted to cheating in high school (Ford, Lenz).
But cheating may be more harmful than just not learning a certain concept. Images show that students in high schools and colleges are learning which is true. But some students do not learn because when you are cheating you are not learning anything.
In an article titled, “Cheating: Long Tern Effects” written by an author from Gifted Child Today, I found that 55 percent of students that cheat are honor students. They also reported that “students are more likely to cheat if they are under pressure to get high grades, uncertain about their own ability, unengaged in the material, or some combination of the three”. Could it be that these “honor students” cheated their way to being honor students? In most cases, students cheat because too much pressure is being placed upon them. In regards to high school students, they have to worry about getting good grades to get into an outstanding university and receive financial assistance to pay for the school as well. In other cases, students are simply too lazy to even try to do the work.
The Essay on Why Some Students Cheat
The first thing to realize is that we all have cheated at one time or another, be it on a game, a test, an exam, or a quiz. The question is why do some students do it? Do they do it for the fun of it, the thrill? Most people, both young and old say that cheating is immoral, but yet they have done it at one time. Some students cheat on their tests because they did not study, fear of failing, or the ...
There are many other reasons why students cheat. One reason could be that their parents haven’t taught them that cheating is wrong. Parents should let their children know that getting a fair C on an exam is better than getting a dishonest A. They should remind their students that cheating come with negative consequences.
In my senior year of high school a friend of mine failed one of her major classes. The reason being that her teacher found out that she was cheating on majority of her work therefore gave her an F for the whole semester. The consequence she had to face was not graduating. She would have to repeat her senior year the following school year. In response to her grade she went to her English teacher and asked if she could bring her grade to a passing grade so that she could graduate on time. The teacher responded that that was the grade she had deserved and she could not change it. My friend then called her parents to the school to talk to the teacher, and the teacher finally changed the grade that she earned to a passing grade of a C. Her parents handled the situation differently than they should have. They should have let her deal with the consequences of cheating. Why let her get away with something like that. In my opinion, I believe that the grade should not have been changed because she did not earn the grade of a C.
Today, students are cheating in a variety of ways such as using the internet on their phone, taking pictures of notes, stealing exams, texting others to get answers, writing answers on body parts, looking at another person’s exam while taking the test, etc. The students that cheat in high schools and colleges act as if they do not know the consequences of cheating. Students that are in high school are disciplined differently from those in colleges. In high school consequences are not severe but vary in most schools. Some high schools call the students parent, send them to the principal’s office, receive an F or 0 on the exam and/or assignment, and in cases like my friend’s story not graduating. Cheating in college is a more severe offense. In most universities, students cheating receive an F for the entire course. Other consequences result in academic probation and being expelled.
The Term Paper on Argumentative Essay On Cheating In School
Argumentative Essay on Cheating In School I will never forget my first experience with "academic dishonesty." It was my junior year of school and my chemistry teacher was not too adequate, to say the least. He gave his lectures in inhuman speeds and still expected us to understand every pearl of wisdom that came out of his mouth! God forbid we ever asked him a question to clarify the topic he was ...
In the article “Too Much Pressure,” written by Colleen Wenke, she researched several different articles to get the answers to her question “Why do students cheat in school?” One of the articles she used in her research was an article by Robin Stansbury who is a reporter for the Connecticut newspaper. Stansbury interviewed several high school students in his article and discovered that many of them feel cheaters do get ahead in the classroom: “In high school, the cheaters always win. They don’t get caught and they are the ones getting 100 on the exams when the noncheaters are getting 80s and 90s. Cheaters do win” (Wenke, 485).
This statement is somewhat true, because if students do not get caught cheating they receive a higher grade than they deserve. This isn’t good for the “noncheaters”. They study for exams, test, quizzes, etc. and get the grade they earn while the cheaters are receiving a dishonest high grade.
When the “noncheaters” see that the cheaters are getting higher grades than them and not getting caught some believe that they can follow along with the cheaters. Stansbury purposes that there is such an enormous increase in cheating because more students are joining in: “They see others cheating and they think they are being unfairly disadvantaged…the only way many of them feel they can keep in the game, to get into the right schools, is to cheat” (Wenke).
This isn’t fair to the students that do not cheat. They are getting sucked into believing that cheating is the only way to get in the right schools. Students who cheat are bringing these noncheaters down. Today, students feel that they are pressured to cheat in order to get good grades.
Cheating come in many different forms. Students cheat for many different reasons. Some students are under too much pressure therefore they believe they have to cheat to achieve. Parents need to be better role models for their children in letting them know that cheating is not good no matter the situation. Teachers and Professors should always discipline students for cheating. Students should learn that there are negative consequences to cheating. Students should understand that they must endure the pressure put upon them if they want to be successful.
The Homework on A Comparative Study on High School Students Between the United States and China
With the development of global economy, the competition in education is becoming an important part of the international competitions. Students all over the world are competing with not only the students in their country but the students in the world. To some degrees, the future competitiveness of a country relies on how great their students are. As for students, their high school time is the ...
Works cited:
“Cheating and Consequences.” Current Students. Web. 2011.
“Cheating: Long Term Effects.” Gifted Child Today. Summer 2011. Academic OneFile. Web.
Colleen Wenke. “Too Much Pressure.” 2007. The Brief Bedford Reader 11th Edition. Print.
Ford, Brad and Lenz, Sara. “Widespread student cheating means that taxpayers are being robbed.” EdBasic Education. Web. 21 July. 2011.
