Comments on: Is This Cheating? http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/2009/04/is-this-cheating/ Economics, Politics, Entertainment and Life in Academia Wed, 18 Jan 2012 20:37:58 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: Matt Nicklay http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/2009/04/is-this-cheating/comment-page-1/#comment-152 Matt Nicklay Sat, 04 Apr 2009 17:34:09 +0000 http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/?p=562#comment-152 Since I haven't already, I should make clear the midterm says nothing about not being able to use outside sources. Since I haven’t already, I should make clear the midterm says nothing about not being able to use outside sources.

]]> By: ProfSwitzer http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/2009/04/is-this-cheating/comment-page-1/#comment-151 ProfSwitzer Sat, 04 Apr 2009 16:26:06 +0000 http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/?p=562#comment-151 Ben -- I take your point about flattery not being a sufficient justification. To be honest, I never really thought that using another professor's questions, when they are out in the public domain, was wrong. In light of this discussion though, in the future I will be sure to have a professor's permission before doing so. I'm not aware of any policy that prevents the use of other professors' questions per se. But while perhaps not legally wrong, it can be interpreted as unprofessional and perhaps unethical. We have actually been recently informed that if you borrow from another professor's syllabus, you are supposed to give them credit. Apparently there is a lot of syllabus stealing in the academic world, because professors do not seem to see anything wrong with it. As to your second paragraph, again, I'm not sure how this situation would be interpreted. If it states on the midterm or on the professor's syllabus that students are only allowed to use their textbook and notes, then this is a clear violation. If nothing is mentioned at all about what can be used, then you have to look to the school's policy, as you stated. The SCSU Student Code of Conduct's violation for academic dishonesty reads as follows: "Academic dishonesty, including but not limited to, cheating, plagiarism, misrepresentation of student status, and resume falsification. Plagiarism includes, but is not limited to, <strong>the use by paraphrase or direct quotation</strong>, the published or unpublished work of another person <strong>without full and clear acknowledgment</strong>; unacknowledged use of materials prepared by another person or agency engaged in selling or otherwise providing term papers or other academic materials; and commercialization, sale or distribution of class notes without the instructors' permission." (emphasis mine) Under this broad definition, it seems to me that quoting the website's answer verbatim would be a violation; but using it as a reference would not be. Looking at the information on the website does not seem to me to be against the rules under this definition unless the professor expressly prohibits it, and it does not appear that is what happened in this case. One problem is that there is really no way to prove any student has done this unless they admit it, so that leads to a situation like Suzi documented: everybody uses it and, when graded on a curve, most students feel like they have to in order to have a fair shot at a good grade in the course. Even when prohibited by the professor, it's hard to prove. So to prevent this kind of thing from happening, professors need to either make their own questions or customize publicly available questions so that students need to know how to work the problems on their own. Ben — I take your point about flattery not being a sufficient justification. To be honest, I never really thought that using another professor’s questions, when they are out in the public domain, was wrong. In light of this discussion though, in the future I will be sure to have a professor’s permission before doing so. I’m not aware of any policy that prevents the use of other professors’ questions per se. But while perhaps not legally wrong, it can be interpreted as unprofessional and perhaps unethical. We have actually been recently informed that if you borrow from another professor’s syllabus, you are supposed to give them credit. Apparently there is a lot of syllabus stealing in the academic world, because professors do not seem to see anything wrong with it.

As to your second paragraph, again, I’m not sure how this situation would be interpreted. If it states on the midterm or on the professor’s syllabus that students are only allowed to use their textbook and notes, then this is a clear violation. If nothing is mentioned at all about what can be used, then you have to look to the school’s policy, as you stated. The SCSU Student Code of Conduct’s violation for academic dishonesty reads as follows:

“Academic dishonesty, including but not limited to, cheating, plagiarism, misrepresentation of student status, and resume falsification. Plagiarism includes, but is not limited to, the use by paraphrase or direct quotation, the published or unpublished work of another person without full and clear acknowledgment; unacknowledged use of materials prepared by another person or agency engaged in selling or otherwise providing term papers or other academic materials; and commercialization, sale or distribution of class notes without the instructors’ permission.” (emphasis mine)

Under this broad definition, it seems to me that quoting the website’s answer verbatim would be a violation; but using it as a reference would not be. Looking at the information on the website does not seem to me to be against the rules under this definition unless the professor expressly prohibits it, and it does not appear that is what happened in this case. One problem is that there is really no way to prove any student has done this unless they admit it, so that leads to a situation like Suzi documented: everybody uses it and, when graded on a curve, most students feel like they have to in order to have a fair shot at a good grade in the course. Even when prohibited by the professor, it’s hard to prove. So to prevent this kind of thing from happening, professors need to either make their own questions or customize publicly available questions so that students need to know how to work the problems on their own.

]]> By: Benjamin Seghers http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/2009/04/is-this-cheating/comment-page-1/#comment-148 Benjamin Seghers Sat, 04 Apr 2009 16:08:36 +0000 http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/?p=562#comment-148 That one would be flattered by their use of their work is not an appropriate justification for using their work. I'm sure I could find plenty of people who would be flattered if I used their work and turned it in as my own for homework. So, I really don't think that's a proper excuse to use other professors' questions. The real justification, of course, is in your second point, which is that the professors are already assumed to know the relevant information. That's why they're there teaching. In addition, and I could be wrong, I'm pretty there's no school policy that bars professors from borrowing questions that other professors use on their exams. As for the student, two wrongs don't make a right. That's just a logical statement. If we are to learn anything from deontological ethics, it's that we have moral obligations, whatever the circumstances. That the professor is a poor teacher does not excuse likewise actions by the student in terms of cheating. Of course, we should define cheating. Would using this source where the question came from be considered cheating under the teacher's and school's policy? If it is, then it would not be ethically correct to do it, regardless of who your professor is. That one would be flattered by their use of their work is not an appropriate justification for using their work. I’m sure I could find plenty of people who would be flattered if I used their work and turned it in as my own for homework. So, I really don’t think that’s a proper excuse to use other professors’ questions. The real justification, of course, is in your second point, which is that the professors are already assumed to know the relevant information. That’s why they’re there teaching. In addition, and I could be wrong, I’m pretty there’s no school policy that bars professors from borrowing questions that other professors use on their exams.

As for the student, two wrongs don’t make a right. That’s just a logical statement. If we are to learn anything from deontological ethics, it’s that we have moral obligations, whatever the circumstances. That the professor is a poor teacher does not excuse likewise actions by the student in terms of cheating. Of course, we should define cheating. Would using this source where the question came from be considered cheating under the teacher’s and school’s policy? If it is, then it would not be ethically correct to do it, regardless of who your professor is.

]]> By: ProfSwitzer http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/2009/04/is-this-cheating/comment-page-1/#comment-135 ProfSwitzer Fri, 03 Apr 2009 23:51:47 +0000 http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/?p=562#comment-135 I wasn't implying that what you did was cheating, Matt. You just looked. If you actually use that information, that may be a different story. But based on what you wrote it does not appear that he precluded you from using all information at your disposal. I wasn’t implying that what you did was cheating, Matt. You just looked. If you actually use that information, that may be a different story. But based on what you wrote it does not appear that he precluded you from using all information at your disposal.

]]> By: Matt Nicklay http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/2009/04/is-this-cheating/comment-page-1/#comment-134 Matt Nicklay Fri, 03 Apr 2009 23:18:55 +0000 http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/?p=562#comment-134 I do not consider what I did cheating. I didn’t mention that being a relevant topic in my original email because I felt comfortable that Dr. Switzer knows I’m not that kind of student. My action to search the exam question on Google was not driven by my own poor intentions. Rather, my actions were driven by a hunch I had that something wasn’t right here, and I was correct. I consider what I did to be good problem solving skills and resourcefulness. Now, let me get back to this professor. First of all, I find it difficult to hold my bias towards the professor aside when trying to rationalize his decisions. We took our other midterm earlier in the semester, in-class. After we got that exam back, a classmate and I both had a question marked right that should have been wrong. I can only assume he gave us the points because he realized he didn’t give us all the information needed to answer the question. The class average on the exam was low because nobody was learning anything from him-- he wasn’t teaching anything. Those of us who were teaching ourselves out of the book were doing significantly better. As I said before, he comes to class very unprepared. When he gets stuck trying to explain a concept, he will usually fumble on words and end up attempting the scapegoat and try to show us proofs, which he can only finish half the time. So the first midterm was a mess, now we have this 2nd midterm. The professor changed his mind 2 days before we were supposed to have an in-class midterm, and emailed us a take-home midterm. The email he sent out was the following: ----------------- Attached is the take-home exam 2. The due date is next Tuesday in class. Please report any possible mistakes in the exam. ---------------- The preemptive warning that there may be mistakes on the exam was a great sign. Especially when I found out that he only modified 1 of the 2 questions on the exam! My opinion for why he made this exam take-home is because he knew his lectures continue to not be effective and the material keeps getting more challenging, so an in-class exam would be too brutal, since many people already have low grades from the last test. Instead, we get to take this exam home for 7 days until everyone has enough time to do well enough that they will actually pass this class. I did the midterm last night in a little over 2 hours. The bottom line is just that this course has been pretty poor so far. It is extremely unfortunate because this is a topic I have a lot of interest in and I was really looking forward to taking this class. I’ll get by, get my grade and complete the requirement, but that’s not what makes a class for me. I do not consider what I did cheating. I didn’t mention that being a relevant topic in my original email because I felt comfortable that Dr. Switzer knows I’m not that kind of student. My action to search the exam question on Google was not driven by my own poor intentions. Rather, my actions were driven by a hunch I had that something wasn’t right here, and I was correct. I consider what I did to be good problem solving skills and resourcefulness.

Now, let me get back to this professor. First of all, I find it difficult to hold my bias towards the professor aside when trying to rationalize his decisions. We took our other midterm earlier in the semester, in-class. After we got that exam back, a classmate and I both had a question marked right that should have been wrong. I can only assume he gave us the points because he realized he didn’t give us all the information needed to answer the question. The class average on the exam was low because nobody was learning anything from him– he wasn’t teaching anything. Those of us who were teaching ourselves out of the book were doing significantly better. As I said before, he comes to class very unprepared. When he gets stuck trying to explain a concept, he will usually fumble on words and end up attempting the scapegoat and try to show us proofs, which he can only finish half the time.

So the first midterm was a mess, now we have this 2nd midterm. The professor changed his mind 2 days before we were supposed to have an in-class midterm, and emailed us a take-home midterm. The email he sent out was the following:
—————–
Attached is the take-home exam 2. The due date is next Tuesday in class. Please report any possible mistakes in the exam.
—————-
The preemptive warning that there may be mistakes on the exam was a great sign. Especially when I found out that he only modified 1 of the 2 questions on the exam! My opinion for why he made this exam take-home is because he knew his lectures continue to not be effective and the material keeps getting more challenging, so an in-class exam would be too brutal, since many people already have low grades from the last test. Instead, we get to take this exam home for 7 days until everyone has enough time to do well enough that they will actually pass this class. I did the midterm last night in a little over 2 hours.

The bottom line is just that this course has been pretty poor so far. It is extremely unfortunate because this is a topic I have a lot of interest in and I was really looking forward to taking this class. I’ll get by, get my grade and complete the requirement, but that’s not what makes a class for me.

]]> By: ProfSwitzer http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/2009/04/is-this-cheating/comment-page-1/#comment-132 ProfSwitzer Fri, 03 Apr 2009 21:52:15 +0000 http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/?p=562#comment-132 I'm almost embarrassed that Suzi picked up on such a glaring omission -- I really didn't even address whether using the internet to get that answer was cheating on this student's part. If it states clearly on the midterm that you cannot use any outside resources, then it's cheating. If he thinks other people will cheat, then he should send an e-mail to the professor informing him that students know this answer is out there, and in the future he might want to do things differently. Perhaps he could make a tiny change in the question to make it ever so slightly different from the web page, so you can easily spot who just stole the answer from the web page, assuming it was exactly the same. If it says open-book, open-note, etc., then the student should feel free to use them. In my mind, that's the cost to the professor of being sloppy and just copying/pasting a question. But I'm not even sure that's the ethically correct thing here. Ah, moral dilemmas. I have no problem with students looking at old exams of mine. In fact, I give students lots of practice questions and tell them some of them will be on the test (but not which ones) so they have to do ALL of them if they want to get an advantage, and in doing all of them they're going to learn the material -- and that's the whole point of giving exams. And since I require explanations on all my exams, even in principles classes, they can't just memorize simple answers to multiple choice questions. Most students don't pick up their final exams, so I don't even think there are any of those in circulation. I will admit that writing the final exam is a bit easier as a result. Nik - I'm certainly aware of that possibity, even using WebCT/Blackboard. I give students plenty of practice questions so that they don't feel the need to do that -- they're not going to find much else out there from other students that I'm not giving them already in the form of practice questions. At some point, students realize there are only so many ways I can ask a question about comparative advantage. I do have colleagues that give midterms, grade them, and will just post the grades and not let the student have the exam back; they can come to office hours and review them to see what they did wrong. Sometimes when I'm writing two different versions of an exam and trying to come up with good questions, I wish I did that... But my main point about using WebCT/Blackboard was that other professors wouldn't be able to use your questions without you knowing it, because they couldn't get a copy. I’m almost embarrassed that Suzi picked up on such a glaring omission — I really didn’t even address whether using the internet to get that answer was cheating on this student’s part. If it states clearly on the midterm that you cannot use any outside resources, then it’s cheating. If he thinks other people will cheat, then he should send an e-mail to the professor informing him that students know this answer is out there, and in the future he might want to do things differently. Perhaps he could make a tiny change in the question to make it ever so slightly different from the web page, so you can easily spot who just stole the answer from the web page, assuming it was exactly the same. If it says open-book, open-note, etc., then the student should feel free to use them. In my mind, that’s the cost to the professor of being sloppy and just copying/pasting a question. But I’m not even sure that’s the ethically correct thing here. Ah, moral dilemmas.

I have no problem with students looking at old exams of mine. In fact, I give students lots of practice questions and tell them some of them will be on the test (but not which ones) so they have to do ALL of them if they want to get an advantage, and in doing all of them they’re going to learn the material — and that’s the whole point of giving exams. And since I require explanations on all my exams, even in principles classes, they can’t just memorize simple answers to multiple choice questions. Most students don’t pick up their final exams, so I don’t even think there are any of those in circulation. I will admit that writing the final exam is a bit easier as a result.

Nik – I’m certainly aware of that possibity, even using WebCT/Blackboard. I give students plenty of practice questions so that they don’t feel the need to do that — they’re not going to find much else out there from other students that I’m not giving them already in the form of practice questions. At some point, students realize there are only so many ways I can ask a question about comparative advantage. I do have colleagues that give midterms, grade them, and will just post the grades and not let the student have the exam back; they can come to office hours and review them to see what they did wrong. Sometimes when I’m writing two different versions of an exam and trying to come up with good questions, I wish I did that… But my main point about using WebCT/Blackboard was that other professors wouldn’t be able to use your questions without you knowing it, because they couldn’t get a copy.

]]> By: Nik Drescher http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/2009/04/is-this-cheating/comment-page-1/#comment-129 Nik Drescher Fri, 03 Apr 2009 21:23:31 +0000 http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/?p=562#comment-129 Let me start out by saying that i've been called "Morally Grey". Now, is it cheating? Yes. You are using an answer that is not yours. Is the prof being lazy? Probably. But, honestly if the prof was that bad and did not respect his student's time enough to be on time for the class or give excuses or advance notice then I would take those answers and run with them. Make sure they are correct, tweak them into my own words and get a good grade. Now is that "right"? Probably not. Also a note on the WebCT/Blackboard comment. If you would happen to know a person in the class a semester ahead of you they can print out/e-mail you all the answers off of WebCT/Blackboard after the teacher publishes them. Then when it comes your time for the class you have the answers. In my experience WebCT has made teachers not want to change their questions, so they just keep it the same year after year. Let me start out by saying that i’ve been called “Morally Grey”. Now, is it cheating? Yes. You are using an answer that is not yours. Is the prof being lazy? Probably. But, honestly if the prof was that bad and did not respect his student’s time enough to be on time for the class or give excuses or advance notice then I would take those answers and run with them. Make sure they are correct, tweak them into my own words and get a good grade.
Now is that “right”? Probably not.
Also a note on the WebCT/Blackboard comment. If you would happen to know a person in the class a semester ahead of you they can print out/e-mail you all the answers off of WebCT/Blackboard after the teacher publishes them. Then when it comes your time for the class you have the answers. In my experience WebCT has made teachers not want to change their questions, so they just keep it the same year after year.

]]> By: Suzi http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/2009/04/is-this-cheating/comment-page-1/#comment-127 Suzi Fri, 03 Apr 2009 20:37:31 +0000 http://www.profswitzer.com/blog/?p=562#comment-127 Hey Switz, Just curious- you never addressed how you felt about the student finding the answers online. Is that an ethics violation, or simply resourcefulness? This very issue came up in my post-bacc program. Some science classes had weekly online "quizzes" whose questions were pulled from test banks. The answers could easily be googled. Most people did that because they assumed everyone else had the same access to the answers online and would do the same. After all, why put yourself at a disadvantage in a class that is graded on a curve? A few people found this horribly unethical and were upset by it. If a huge portion of the student's grade was determined by these quizzes, I'd understand, but since it was only 10% of the grade, and the rest was determined by in-class midterms and a final exam, I didn't think much of it. Those who truly understood the material would succeed. What are your thoughts? Also, how do you feel about students acquiring old exams and using them as study guides? I know that some schools consider it "cheating," while others accept that it's done. After all, aren't sororities and fraternities famous/notorious (depending on your POV) for keeping files like this? My personal belief is that most classes are designed so that you can only succeed if you have a command of the material. There are only small margins where utilizing old tests or googling answers for classwork would make much of a difference. Since some students are clearly taking advantage, shouldn't all of them to make it fair? As an older student, I'm definitely more interested in learning the material than anything else and feel like I'm cheating myself if I take short-cuts. However, I also want to avoid being a sucker and allowing myself a disadvantage when everyone else is using whatever resources they can find to get an edge. It's weird to be a student again. Hey Switz,
Just curious- you never addressed how you felt about the student finding the answers online. Is that an ethics violation, or simply resourcefulness? This very issue came up in my post-bacc program. Some science classes had weekly online “quizzes” whose questions were pulled from test banks. The answers could easily be googled. Most people did that because they assumed everyone else had the same access to the answers online and would do the same. After all, why put yourself at a disadvantage in a class that is graded on a curve? A few people found this horribly unethical and were upset by it. If a huge portion of the student’s grade was determined by these quizzes, I’d understand, but since it was only 10% of the grade, and the rest was determined by in-class midterms and a final exam, I didn’t think much of it. Those who truly understood the material would succeed. What are your thoughts?

Also, how do you feel about students acquiring old exams and using them as study guides? I know that some schools consider it “cheating,” while others accept that it’s done. After all, aren’t sororities and fraternities famous/notorious (depending on your POV) for keeping files like this? My personal belief is that most classes are designed so that you can only succeed if you have a command of the material. There are only small margins where utilizing old tests or googling answers for classwork would make much of a difference. Since some students are clearly taking advantage, shouldn’t all of them to make it fair?

As an older student, I’m definitely more interested in learning the material than anything else and feel like I’m cheating myself if I take short-cuts. However, I also want to avoid being a sucker and allowing myself a disadvantage when everyone else is using whatever resources they can find to get an edge.

It’s weird to be a student again.

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