Cheating on Tests

Julie

Cheating on your papers is not the only thing that can land you in hot water.  Cheating on exams is highly prevalent amongst students, with some agencies reporting that up to 3/4 of all students cheat at one point or another.  With technology such an integral part of our lives, it’s no wonder that students are now coming up with ingenious ways to use it to their advantage.

Some methods of cheating that tech savvy students are using these days are sending text messages and photos of exams to other students.  Not sure of the answer to a question?  Some students will text their friends to get the answer.  With the new ringtone that teens and young adults can hear, that adults cannot, they can easily notify eachother without the instructor hearing a thing.  How are some teachers combatting this?  They may confiscate cell phones prior to exams, and if they’re really crafty they might activate something called C-Guard, which blocks cell phone signals within a 262 foot radius.

iPods are another sneaky way students are cheating and getting ahead during exams. iPod-ready crib notes published by SparkNotes and iPod dictionaries are being published and sold by a company called iPREPpress.  iPREPpress retails reference material that is viewable on digital players, such as the iPod nano.  Other students record lectures and notes to audio, and then save it on their iPods to listen to during an exam. 

Then there are the old tricks of the notebook on the floor, notes on the inside label of your water bottle, special pens imprinted with test info in super-tiny writing.

Getting away with cheating on a test is much easier now than getting away with turning in a plagerized paper.  But the consequences are similar.  If you get caught, automatic failure in most schools.  Repeat incidents might get you tossed out, or put on academic probation. 

So other than the moral issues at stake, deciding whether or not to cheat leaves you weigh whether the risks are worth the potential rewards.

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