Questions tagged [cheating]
Pertaining to preventing, punishing, or handling the consequences of academic dishonesty in coursework or examinations. Also, defining what constitutes academic dishonesty. (For questions on dishonesty in the research and/or research publication process, use 'research-misconduct' instead.)
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Moral dilemma in unwittingly being paid to complete a student's work
I am a computer science freelancer who takes on medium-sized projects I can complete in a month or less. I was approached by someone who wanted a set of 12 tutorials at least 500 words each about ...
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Writing a recommendation letter for a student I reported for academic dishonesty
A few years ago, I reported a student for academic dishonesty (in a graduate-level mathematics course, they were copying solutions off the internet, nearly verbatim). After acknowledging their wrong-...
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I was caught cheating on an exam, how can I minimize the damage?
I got caught cheating in a two-hour engineering exam consisting of 100 multiple choice questions which was done online through the moodle e-learning software. I feel like my life is almost over.
...
user23292
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17
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Is it okay to report classmates cheating on exams?
Is it acceptable or ok to report on students cheating? Many times during a test or an exam, I have seen students in front of me either passing notes, or otherwise collaborating whenever the professor ...
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11
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Fellow student asked question from take-home exam on Stack Exchange
In an advanced university course on computer science and problem solving, one of my fellow students asked for a solution to a home exam on one of the Stack Exchange sites. The question he asked is ...
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Only one student answered an exam question - and I strongly suspect he cheated
Today we (professors + teaching assistants) proctored a midterm exam for a class of about 80 students. There was undoubtedly a "hardest" question on the exam, since nearly the entire classroom of ...
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How can I prevent students from writing answers on an assignment, then claiming I didn't see their answer?
What is a good way to prevent students from writing an answer after you hand back a graded assignment (exam/homework) and claiming that you did not see their answer?
It is clear to me that this ...
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Student caught cheating when leaving class after handing me the exam
Usually I am quite clear that cheating and plagiarism are unacceptable. Although every semester I have to deal with several cases of plagiarism, I had not expected students to brazenly cheat in exams. ...
user12512
106
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21
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How to prevent students from using modified calculators to cheat on exams?
Recently my faculty (mathematics and statistics) and I have been dealing with widespread cheating due to calculators that have been modified so as to have more functionality than is permitted.
At my ...
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What to do if I have seen an exam before I have taken it?
Today I saw a photograph of an upcoming exam at my university. At first I thought it was last year's exam; so I took a closer look at it as I think it is okay to see last year's exams even if they ...
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Is having access to past exams cheating and, if yes, could it be proven just by a good grade?
I studied for three weeks straight for an exam because I was really anxious to pass it with a high grade, while everyone else didn’t study much. Now the problem is, I had access to the exam from the ...
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Professor does not care about cheating, what should TA do?
I am a PhD student, working as a Homework marking TA in a school where cheating is extremely blatant. The university has an extremely strict policy against cheating. Hundreds of students in math ...
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103
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11
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Is it unethical to supply a marked solution to a student who has shown intent to cheat, with the intent of identifying them for punishment?
One of the adjuncts that I work with found that one of their students had posted their assignment on a freelancer website asking for the solution. We joked that he should place a bid and fail them ...
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102
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Professor falsely accusing me of cheating in a class he does not teach, two months after end of the class. What precautions should I take?
I'm a domestic student in the US at a medium-sized state school. Despite my poor English, it's my first language.
A few months ago, I finished a class on web development.
My final submission was a ...
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What is the justification for the typical punishment of a student who did not cheat but helped others cheat?
Imagine this scenario: you're in an exam. Somebody asks for your help to answer a question. You help them (whisper the answer, slip them a note, whatever). You get caught. You get punished.
That's ...
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Two-thirds of my class colluded. Should I report them to the academic offences committee?
I teach a module in an electrical engineering MSc programme in the UK for which the students are given a technical project that carries 25% of the total marks. The project is a group assignment and ...
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How to react when a team of colleagues obviously made up some results?
In a recent paper, a team of colleagues published results that are clearly made up. I am 100 % sure of that because my position at the university involves the management of the animals they used in ...
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Accused of cheating due to the time accounted by Blackboard
Since the exams this year for college is online, there is a timer. Usually, when I start an exam I click a random answer choice or what I think is right at that moment. Once I finish most of it, I go ...
user131727
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15
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Should I cheat if the majority does it?
I'm taking the last and hardest exams of my master degree. During the exams we aren't allowed to use anything else but our brain. Cheating is pretty easy though: one has the lecture notes and all the ...
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Is it plagiarism to reference a fictitious source?
I'm dealing with a student essay that references three books in support of a claim. None of the books referenced have authors listed, and, based on the contents of the student's essay, I can't find ...
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Is my approach to discouraging whiners from taking my class acceptable?
I am writing a syllabus for a Calculus for Business class. When I taught the last year, I had some very weak but vocal students whine that the tests were tough (despite other students doing fine), the ...
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Did I cheat on an exam by knowing a solution in advance?
I am a mathematics student in the US. For a recent exam, I achieved one of the highest scores. The problem is that the final question was intended to be a challenge, rather than one "average&...
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I used a solution that I happened to already have on my laptop on an exam. Did I cheat?
In a programming in-class test, one of the problems was to write up a certain famous program in Maple. However, I had already written up this program prior to the test just as a hobby, and it was in a ...
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Didn't pay attention to rules and created an illegal note card for exam?
For final exam in my university chemistry class, a note sheet, 8 by 11, was allowed. You could put anything on the sheet, however it was to remain 1-sided. Of all things, I forgot about the last rule, ...
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10
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What to do with someone that cheated their way through university and a PhD program?
A person I know cheated through most of their science classes while an undergrad. They literally had someone else take the exams, write reports, and do most of the homework. They then took their ...
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Other students can easily cheat on a test and the grading system is relative - should I cheat, and what else can I do?
Amid the pandemic, a test that has traditionally been in-class is now planned to be held as follows:
The examiner starts a Zoom conference.
The students join the conference from their homes, turning ...
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66
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8
answers
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Can online recording of work area at home be made a mandatory criterion for passing exams midway through a course?
Right now with the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada I believe most Ontario universities and colleges have their classes online, and my university decided to do that as well. With this in mind, many of our ...
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Students using the same flawed online solution sheet as the grading TA
I am in a small electricity and magnetism class, and I have recently become aware of other students using an online solution sheet (on slader.com). On the most recent homework, I (who didn't use the ...
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8
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An undergraduate said they may hire a freelancer to do their work for them. What should I do?
I, a graduate student, have started tutoring undergraduates in computer science at my university to help make ends meet. One student who inquired about my services turned me down upon hearing my rates ...
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5
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Do academic integrity pledges work?
Our students are asked to sign an "academic integrity" pledge with each assignment and exam, vowing that they have not given nor received unauthorized assistance on the assignment.
What (peer-...
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10
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Is there any way to detect high tech (e.g. cell-phone assisted) academic dishonesty?
Over the last few years, our university has seen a rise in high-tech academic dishonesty. We have a no electronics policy, except calculators when needed (even those now are provided by the school, ...
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Previous publication of my supervisor and a post-doc is a lie
I am in a bit of a situation. Basically, the research on which I was basing my PhD was carried out by a former post-doc in our group. After one year and a half not being able to replicate his results, ...
user138908
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14
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I received an allegation of academic misconduct from my university. What should I do?
I wrote an exam a couple of months ago and I recently received an email accusing me of academic misconduct. I had just finished my first year of university and this is the first time that I am ...
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10
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I did something I am not proud of, and was rightly accused of cheating by the instructor. What is next for me?
A throwaway account for this issue I need advice in. I am in an engineering course and had an online exam (thanks to COVID-19) with no form of protection for cheating, just an "open now, turn in ...
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Dealing with aggressive student suspected to be cheating
In a previous test one of my TAs discovered a fraudulent pattern in six of the exams. The answers were uncomfortably similar, actually identical in many places. I called the students to my office and ...
user85612
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9
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Given 0s on Assignments with suspected and dismissed cheating?
Basically, I coded several assignments and a friend turned in code which looks almost identical. I didn't give him my code, and, as far as I know, he didn't even have any way to access it - but it ...
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What can I do about undergraduate students cheating?
So I lecture at a university on the department of mathematics and statistics, and this year I am teaching calculus for future mathematicians. One good thing about the mathematics course is that very ...
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7
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What are the ethical considerations when publishing a cheating technique?
Suppose I have devised a way to cheat at cards, exams or any other situation in which secret communication with other people or machines provides unfair advantage. The method is novel and uses ...
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8
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Cheated on an exam when I was eight years old. Should I tell graduate admissions?
I cheated at a language exam when I was eight years old. I finished early and noticed that I had accidentally left a dictionary in my drawer. I double-checked my answers and promptly got caught.
The ...
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A student who asked me to write a rec letter seems to have committed academic dishonesty in my class, what do I do?
A student (let's call them A) in my class that I just finished teaching asked me to write them a recommendation letter. I said yes, and the first deadline is Dec 15, as they often are (FYI, I'm ...
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How to prevent cheating on take-home exams
For certain undergrad classes, I assign a take-home exam, rather than the more familiar in-class exam. When I distribute the exam, I remind the students that this is an individual exam, and that they ...
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My partner posted our code on Github and I am now being investigated for cheating. What to do?
Last year I took a class where we had to work with a partner on programming assignments. Apparently someone's solution from this year has a 50% match with our solution from last year. I did not ...
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4
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I've been wrongfully accused of plagiarism. What can strengthen my case?
I submitted an assignment in February and I recently received an email accusing me of academic misconduct. I have just finished my second year of university and this is the first time that I have ever ...
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10
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Accused of cheating on masters final; afraid that appeal will bring retaliation (ruining PhD applications)
A friend of mine is finishing up a masters program and has applied to PhD programs around the nation last fall, as well as within the existing college. She had received several glowing letters of ...
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I witnessed massive cases of corruption and cheating in my university. Now what?
I have dedicated four years of my life in a journey at a so-called "respectable" university in the Middle East as an undergraduate student pursuing my degree. In this journey, a period ...
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Cheating among the international students very common in college. What should I do?
I am an international student in an European country. During midterms and finals, I realized that more than half of the students are overtly cheating. I do not mean just looking other student's paper, ...
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Acquaintance is paying friend to do his coding for an Ivy League master's degree. What should I do?
I'm relatively close to someone who is currently attending an Ivy League graduate program. He believes he has it all made in life and yet here he is paying one of my friends to do his coding ...
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7
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How to handle someone propositioning me to collude/cheat with them on an assignment?
I am in my final year of undergraduate. Another student, call him John, sent me a message on Facebook saying basically:
Can you send me the solutions to the assignment from unit X, that you
took last ...
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9
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Going back to university after suspension, how do I move past the shame?
I was suspended for 1 year from my university for copying an assignment from an online source. There were several extenuating circumstances but I won't go into them as they are irrelevant, I did cheat ...
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11
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Preventing leaking exam papers/cheating using phone cameras?
I work at an educational institution where exam papers are considered protected. Leaking the exam question sheet and taking photocopies or camera shots is considered illegal and is strictly prohibited....
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