Imagine this scenario. A little after Mr. Smith, your history teacher, gives out the class’ weekly history quiz, you see Harry, your classmate sitting in beside you, draw a handkerchief that seems dirty because of some black scribbles on it. He puts his piece of cloth on his lap then covered it with his huge hand. While taking the quiz, you notice Harry removes his hand on his lap then looks at his handkerchief as if he is reading something. He does this while alertly looking at Mr. Smith. You are seeing it with your own eyes: Harry is cheating.
Cheating has been the one of the problems of almost every teacher everywhere for over 30 years (McCabe et al, 2001).
Von Dran, Callahan, and Taylor pointed out that cheating “is defined in the literature as intentionally unethical behavior”. Furthermore, Weaver, Davis, Look, Buzzanga, and Neal interpreted academic dishonesty as “a violation of an institution’s policy on honesty”. Another definition of academic dishonesty is by using unacceptable materials in any academic activity (Lambert et al, 2003).
There are several forms of cheating. These are: 1) using unauthorized ways to answer a test; 2) changing other people’s documents; 3) plagiarism; 4) getting a research paper that has been written by others and submitting it; 5) breaking the rules; 6) changing the result of a particular research; and 7) lying about providing work late (Arent, 1991; Moore, 1988; Packer, 1990; Pratt, and Mclauglin, 1989) (cited in Lambert et al, 2003).
The Term Paper on Academic Dishonesty and the Internet in Higher Education
Just as the industrial revolution brought drastic changes to how people lived in the 18th and 19th centuries, the digital age is a new era in which we are living that both recently has brought and is currently bringing about many changes in the way we live. This new so called digital age has manipulated the way we live. It has changed the way we interact and socialize, the way we process and get ...
As an addition, Davis says that pointing to some the answers by using any part of the body such as fingers to show a student the answers of these questions is another way of cheating (cited in Carter et al, 2003).
Academic dishonesty has been “pestering” universities for the last 30 years and has still been one of the major problems happening in every school.
There are several factors on why students cheat. Some students cheat because they think they cannot pass a particular course without the “help” of cheating. Some cheat because they have not studied their lessons prior to the exam or have not finished the required paperwork. Furthermore, others commit academic dishonesty because of some sort of competition (McCabe, 1992).
The ongoing problem on academic dishonesty has many negative effects on both students and teachers. First, students will ignore their instructor’s explanations or will not study in their homes since they are planning to cheat in their tests. Due to this incident, students will lose the chance to acquire new information since they only rely on cheating to pass their courses.
Equally important, students lose the opportunity to receive help from there instructor because they resort to cheating rather than sharing to their teachers the things that they did not understand on class. Similarly, if a teacher notice that there are occurrences of cheating in his class, he may feel that his efforts are being neglected by his students. Because of this, teachers might stop looking for new methods of teaching or developing their manners of explaining. To sum up, the problem on cheating or academic dishonesty has many negative effects on people (whether a student or a teacher) in any academic level.
The problem of cheating together with its damaging effects can be found in almost all colleges and universities for over 30 years (McCabe et al, 2001).
The Essay on Catching A Cheat Students Teacher First
This is an essay regarding the techniques a teacher uses to catch a cheat. First and foremost, kids are typically not smart enough to change enough "big words" to fool a certified teacher. I am a perfect example of a teacher who knows immediately if the students has taken a step far beyond their skill level. That is the first element of catching a cheat. The second element is simply one of ...
There are several actions that were conducted to decrease the occurrence of cheating and to ultimately eliminate this problem. A particular action is that most of the Colleges nowadays in the United States implement similar academic sanctions. For example, the Sonoma State University in California gives students who are caught cheating a grade of F or gives them a much lower grade than the scores that they got from the particular tests.
Furthermore, in Iowa State University, if students are caught cheating during the examination time or even out of class work, they would fail the course even if they drop these classes. In addition, the University of Toledo in Ohio deals with students who are caught guilty of academic dishonesty by giving F grades to them or ultimately failing these students in the course. Also, if a student is caught cheating, he will not be allowed to withdraw from the course. Besides giving F grades and failing in the course, other colleges and universities treat cheating students by forcing them to write additional research papers or retaking the examination.
Solutions:
There are several ways to confront the act of academic dishonesty. One popular action that teachers do when they caught their students cheating is giving them a failing grade. Here is a sample situation. While taking your history exam, you see Harry cheating while Mr. Smith is not looking on Harry. Then suddenly, while Harry is busy on looking at his “dirty hanky”, he forgets that Mr. Smith is in your class. All of a sudden, Mr. Smith catches Harry while he is copying answers. Then Mr. Smith swiftly grabs Harry’s paper and tears it into pieces in front of your classroom. You should know what happens next. Harry is given a failing grade by Mr. Smith.
At first, failing a student caught cheating in class is the first thing that is done by most teachers. By failing the student, the teacher shows the rest of the class on what he or she would do if he catches anyone cheating. In a sense, giving a failing grade to a student caught cheating serves as an example for others. As a result, other students would not dare to cheat on class and because of this, cheating could be minimized. Though this action may seem to be very effective for the teachers, there are some students who would just not stop on cheating because they think that they will not be caught by his/her teachers. But overall, giving a failing grade to a student can be a very effective way to confront students who cheat and a good solution to minimize incidents of academic dishonesty.
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 ...
Another popular way to confront students who committed cheating is to force them to retake the examination or force them to submit a special research paper. This action may be possible if a teacher is kind enough to reconsider the offenses that his/her students have committed. By retaking the examination, a student will have a chance to regain his former stature. On the other hand, writing a research paper about the cheaters’ history of cheating and its ethical correctness is a great idea because of some benefits. The advantages of this assignment are helping students to be aware of cheating because of the paper that they have written about cheating, and they will understand the ethical issues of this problem. Second, it is beneficial for students’ grades because the cheaters are going to regain their scores instead of getting an F grade. This solution helps the authors to decrease cheating to nearly zero after the cheaters had confessed and written the research.
Another solution to deal with a cheating student is proposed by Fraser. Fraser in 1987 suggested that the most effective solution for academic dishonesty is to follow these steps: Discussing the problem with the cheaters after class could be the first step; after that the students will fail the exam. Next, they would take another exam and obtain its score. By following these steps, students would get some benefits, such as feedback and some advice from their instructors, and the relationship between them would be positive because students are not required to fail the test. As a result, when teachers and cheaters have great communication, they can have an effective classroom environment. Also, that can help students to like the classes and try to study instead of cheating. To illustrate, if the faculty didn’t do anything about this problem or just made students fail the course, sent them for committee review, or tore their paper, these would not be solutions because there are no consequences for students. They would not consider these as solutions or addressing this problem (Carter et al, 2006).
As an addition, I interviewed Ms. Donna who is an instructor at the Intensive IEP at University of Washington, and asked her some questions. First, I asked her on why, even though teachers have the power in the classrooms, are they (teachers) unable to decrease cheating. She stated that teachers always try to work very carefully about preventing students from cheating because they must be able to prove it. If the teachers couldn’t prove that students cheated, they could be sued due to violating the “human rights of America”. Also, she added that the power has been taken away from teachers because of “violating human rights of America”. Second, I asked her if she thought students who give their effort for others are satisfied with their work. Her response was that it is a cultural helping in some societies sometimes. I asked her what she thought were the reasons for cheating. She understands all the reasons for students’ cheating. However, she thinks reasons are not an excuse. In addition, cheating can prevent the cheaters from getting their teachers’ help. To illustrate, instructors can’t help cheaters because they won’t know about the students’ needs. Finally, I asked her if there is any way that can be helpful to decrease cheating. She responded that prevention makes it possible by doing some ideas, such as making spaces between students, test design, balancing the work grades between out and inside classes, and permitting students to make mistakes without pressure. Also, testing the same thing in different ways is a great idea because students can have the opportunity to demonstrate their knowledge, and not giving students online tests.
The Essay on College Students Cheating on Exams
In today’s age when you look at the word “Cheating”, you may find many different definitions or meanings. Whether you cheat at work; known as fraud, cheat at home; known as dishonesty, or at school, this act of conduct can lead to many consequences made by ones choice. Cheating as a word to me means to not follow rules or standards brought up as a person. As we focus today on students cheating, ...
As a summary, there can be several solutions for academic dishonesty. A good enumeration is given by Carter in 2006. These are: 1) giving a failing test grade for every student who cheated; 2) failing the course even if the students pass their other classes; 3) retaking the examination; 4) cutting the test paper of a student who is caught cheating in front of the whole class; 5) discussing the situation with the students caught cheating after the particular quiz or test; 6) asking the cheaters to discuss their problem with the faculty; and 7) ignoring the cheating committed by students. Instead of punishing students or treating their cheating behavior, it is better to find solutions on how cheating will be minimized or ultimately be eliminated in classrooms.
The Term Paper on Honor Code Students Cheating Student
... 2000 Focus on Ethics Can Curb Cheating, Colleges Find Behavior: Academic dishonesty is rampant, but students will respond to higher standards of ... caught two years ago lifting another student's homework because he couldn't figure out some problems. "I knew I made a mistake ... test before they did-one of the most common forms of cheating. By comparison, on campuses that place less emphasis on academic ...
Conclusion:
Academic dishonesty or more commonly known as ‘cheating’ is a problem that is compromised in all studying levels. This phenomenon has been happening in almost all colleges and universities for over 30 years. This widespread problem produces numerous negative effects for the students and also for teachers. For instance, a student who cheats during his schooldays might carry his habit for the rest of his life. Hence, that particular student may live in a world full of dishonesty.
Another way to decrease the instance of academic dishonesty is that teachers should be aware enough of the reasons on why their students are encouraged to commit cheating.
