When is it acceptable to report classmates who cheat on an exam? [duplicate]

Question

So for one of my computer science classes, we have a WhatsApp chat among all students in the class to network and help each other out with questions regarding homework, or if we have any confusion on assignments. It's a given that we can get help on these types of assignments.

But exams are proctored online, and getting help on them is strictly forbidden. However, some students in the chat have posted to the WhatsApp chat during their proctored exams, posting photos of the exams, the questions, and receiving help from others during their exams.

Why would I care about this? So normally, when a student cheats on an exam, it would have no effect on another student because the two overall students' grades are unrelated. However, the exams are curved. So these students that cheated on the exams **not only have an unfair advantage, ** but they also put other students at a disadvantage. Them doing exceptionally better than they would have has the potentiality to reduce other students grades by up to 10-15% of what it would be. So if Student A would normally get a 65 because they don't know the content, they now get a 89, thus, throwing off the entire curve. However, student B who actually DID try his hardest and studied got an 74. Their grade would have been higher with the curve, but student A cheating disrupted the curve. As a result, student B gets an 79, where they would've had an 84 without the several cheaters with almost perfect exam scores at the top.

Personally, I hate to be 'that girl' that reports someone else like a snitch... But I worked so hard in this class. I studied for 6 hours every day before this exam, and got an 83... and these people admit in chat that they would probably fail if they didn't use WhatsApp (have it screenshotted-saying that exactly). So I worked so hard and got an 83. They cheated and got a solid 90, doing no studying, no hard work on their own part. They work full time, so they complain they don't have time. But how is that my fault, or the fault of the other students that the cheater makes different life choices, or chooses to put less time into school, and we as a result should suffer? That's my rationale for wanting to report them. I play fair, so why should we suffer because they don't?

Answer 1

The answer to the title question is:

Always

(barring some sort of really bizarre circumstances that I am not able to think of right now).
The specifics of the situations does not make me change my answer in this case.

Answer 2

There is absolutely no reason for you to hate being “that girl”. You need to understand that the mindset that being a “snitch” is a negative thing is a result of cultural conditioning that you have been subjected to. Probably historically there were good reasons for societies to associate negative feelings with snitching (e.g., resisting an evil king or dictator who makes stupid rules, and his cronies who reward people who snitch out citizens who violate those rules). Unfortunately today in modern democratic societies we are stuck with that anachronistic mindset even though the reasons for it are no longer even a little bit applicable.

So, you need to rethink your assumptions about what it means to be a snitch. In the context of your situation, complaining about the cheating will be doing a huge service not just to yourself but also to your honest peers, to your university and its reputation, to future employers of graduates of your university, and ultimately (although they are unlikely to see things that way) to the cheating students themselves, who will be taught a valuable lesson at a point in their lives when the stakes for dishonest behavior are still relatively low. I know it’s easier to say this advice than to follow it, but there is no reason for you to feel any guilt or other negative emotions about reporting the cheating. Whatever consequences are visited on the cheating students, they brought them on themselves and fully deserve them.

The only word of caution is that you must take great care to maintain your anonymity, to avoid social ostracism or other negative consequences for your complaint, which are a very real danger.

Answer 3

To add to the other answer: Always- unless you don't want to risk retaking the exam yourself.

A couple of years ago, during a class-wide final coursework assessment for German, everyone had to write out their pre-prepared essays from memory.

(This was the old-GCSE exam in the UK, I guess an international equivalent would be an end-of-year exam in 'freshman' year).

I was among a mere handful of the class that had bothered to memorise their scripts in advance. On the day, we were allowed dictionaries on our desks, and 10 words on a sheet of paper as an aide memoir. However, about 55% of the class had brought their draft scripts in, and were copying directly from them.

Although this angered me, I figured that the drafts they'd written in advance still weren't good enough to merit a higher grade than they deserved, so I let it be.

About a week later, someone's parents complained to the school about the "unfair advantage" (ironically, the person who'd reported it had been one of the ones who cheated), and the school made the whole class resit the exam.

At this stage I'd already began to forget most of my script, so I had to put effort into memorising it again.

After the resit, a few of the cheaters' grades went down, but, as predicted, a few of the already-low grades remained relatively unchanged.

My new grade was only eight marks lower than the first had been, but that was enough to bring it down to an A rather than an A* (A+).

Your situation seems quite different, so I'd encourage you to report it, just try and keep the knowledge fresh in your mind, just in case you need to resit.

Answer 4

Some people cheating is unlikely to significantly sway the curve one way or other. By reporting this you will affect someone much more negatively than how they affected you. Also, if it ever gets out that you were the "snitch", you will incur a significant social standing hit and may very well be excluded from any future whatsapp groups for example.