Cheating Cheats Students

By Natascha Terc

Casually glancing at a friend’s exam, forgetting quotation marks or submitting the same paper for two classes may seem harmless, but they are all forms of cheating.

On most campuses, more than 75 percent of students admit to some cheating, according to the Center for Academic Integrity at Duke University — and students at TCU are no exception.

Michael Russel, associate dean of Campus Life, said there are both intentional and unintentional instances of cheating.

“I think students sometimes don’t know that they are breaking a rule,” Russel said. “Students who write a paper for one class and later submit it to another don’t always realize that’s cheating.”

Russel said college students are developing their own code of ethics.

“There are always people who haven’t developed a set of personal values consistent with not cheating,” Russel said. “In high school, students don’t cheat because they don’t want to get caught. I hope over time students don’t cheat because they realize they are depriving themselves of the academic experience.”

Russel said he thinks most students cheat to stay alive academically, and not because they want high grades.

“My experience with students caught cheating is that in a particular class they were doing marginally,” Russel said. “They were trying to just keep their hopes alive in that class.”

Russel said studying from old tests is a good learning aid.

“I presume that professors change their exams if they think one has gotten out,” Russel said. “If we know about a test being stolen, we need to deal with it. What deters cheating is the reporting of it.”

Since he came to TCU in 1993, Russel said he is not aware of any suspensions or expulsions because of cheating.

Russel said he does not have specific numbers of students who have been caught cheating because they are handled by the deans.

“I think TCU is trying to abide by its mission statement to produce ethical leaders in a global community,” he said. “Those aren’t hollow words. That’s a very difficult thing to do.”

Merry Buchanan, instructor of speech communication, said her personal policy is to handle all cheating incidents with as much discipline as university policy allows.

“If students are in class, participate and do what they’re supposed to do, they have the information,” Buchanan said. “Students don’t learn from memorizing old tests, and that’s not why they are in college.”

Buchanan said she does not release her tests to students after they receive their grades.

“Cheating is cheating,” Buchanan said. “If you are in college and you come here to cheat, you have no business here.”

Students cheat because they are under pressure to make good grades, Buchanan said.

“Whether it is financial aid, scholarship or parental pressure, students are under pressure to make what they call good grades -- nothing under A’s and B’s,” Buchanan said. “Students have this mindset that they expect these really high grades for mediocre or even well below average work.”

Buchanan has been at TCU for less than a year and said she has yet to encounter a student who cannot do the work required.

“I do have students who won’t or don’t do the work,” Buchanan said. “I think it’s a matter of laziness and a lot of students want professors to give grades. I have a real problem with that attitude.”

George Brown, associate professor of theater, said there is a tendency to cheat at TCU.

“We’re at an age now where our value system is somewhat twisted,” Brown said. “Students don’t come into class asking what they have to do to learn something, but what they have to do to get an A.”

Brown said when the process of education is corrupted so it is all about grades, students will find ways to get those A’s.

“We’re being conditioned that it’s not about the process, but the product,” Brown said. “I think we are here for an education, and I don’t condone cheating or the bastardization of the learning process. But I know that all too often we put too much focus on the grade rather than how or what the student is learning.”

Included in Brown’s five-page syllabus for his survey of theater class is a full-page detailing the university’s policy on cheating.

Brown said he takes incidents of cheating on an individual basis.

“Even though policy is blanket and we don’t allow for it, we don’t allow for it in different degrees of punishment,” he said.

Brown said dealing with every single instance of cheating would be impossible.

“It would be like a cop trying to write tickets for jaywalking,” he said.

Brown said he would not be surprised if some professors turn their heads at cheating because of the political and legal climate.

“You accuse a student of cheating, and if mommy and daddy get involved, it could turn into a libel suit,” he said. “I think that some professors definitely feel that it’s easier to just let it slide by.”

A student in Brown’s class once turned in a paper for her boyfriend without his knowledge so that he would not fail, Brown said.

“What do you do with that situation when the best intentions ultimately result in cheating?” Brown asked. “You just have to weigh the situations. Where you deal with it and how you deal with it depends on how much of a heart attack professors want, I guess.”

Brown gave the students 24 hours to turn in their own papers or fail.

“Education is about personal growth,” he said. “What type of personal growth do students have if everyone else is doing their work for them?”
Test files in sororities and fraternities promote cheating, Brown said.

“Unless the professor releases the test for public domain, it is copyrighted material,” Brown said. “For a student or any organization to have a copy of that test is theft.”

Brown said that he changes his tests although he does not release them to students. He said he knows they have gotten out. During his eight years at TCU, Brown said that he has dealt with hundreds of cheating incidents.

“I would rather students learn from the mistakes they make than get them kicked out of college,” Brown said. “We’re here to learn, and part of what we have to learn is about ourselves.”

Natascha Terc
n.f.terc@student.tcu.edu