Putting aside the very hairy area of cheating in relationships, I’m wondering about academic cheating. Before college, I attended a very small, liberal all-girls school where everyone knew everyone else and we were all trained to be as “honorable” as could be. We all had to re-sign an extensive honor code each year, and there were serious penalties for violating it.

I remember in my senior year of high school, one girl was found to have plagiarized part of a paper from the internet. Not only was she suspended; she had to deliver a speech in front of the entire class, explaining why plagiarism was wrong.

Princeton has been particularly aggressive on the cheating front in the same way. We have honor code meetings, have to write a page on matriculation illustrating our understanding of it, and get regular updates from the honor committee. All the same, when I arrived there I discovered whole new layers of gray areas.

In problem set classes, for example, there are plenty of people who like to work in study groups. That’s all well and good, except when “study groups” turn into “let’s just copy the answers off each other.” I thought that kind of behavior was only in the occasional math class, but I was surprised to learn that it’s much more prevalent in college. When all that matters for your future career is that good grade in an Orgo class, it can be extremely tempting just to write down the process and answer of your friends, whether you understand it or not, and worry about the final exam later. Read More »

I remember that one exam I bombed.

Sauntering into the huge lecture room with confidence, I grabbed myself a blue book and 15-page questionnaire and found a seat. I had only spent a few hours studying the night before, but it was fine, because I was taking the class Pass/Fail, and had already secured enough good grades to keep me in the Pass range, no matter how I did on the final. Plus, it was Ancient Greek. Who does well on the final exam (which reviewed the entire year) in Ancient Greek? The coolness factor of learning a dead language wore off after the first couple of weeks, and by this exam, I was happy if I never say another Gamma or Delta in my life.

I proceeded to fail the final for three hours, and when finally satisfied with my poor memory and congregation skills, I passed the test in and walked out of the door. Who cares? I thought, practically skipping back to my dorm. No more Greek for the rest of my life!

The numbers came back, and I did indeed fail. Miserably. But as soon as I looked at my final grade, my nonchalance immediately disappeared. The Registrar didn’t have me down as P/F in Ancient Greek, they had me with a letter grade! A very horrible letter grade.

I was pissed, I was embarrassed, and most importantly, my workaholic status had been blemished. But what could I do? I had been an idiot. Twice. Once for never checking if the Registrar had my records in order, and twice for sitting in the back of the library and laughing with a friend instead of reviewing “Kronos and His Family”.

Little did I know, I could have sued. Read More »