Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!columbia!rutgers!princeton!allegra!ulysses!gamma!pyuxp!rruxa!gwl From: gwl@rruxa.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.edu Subject: Cheating on Programming Assignments (Honor System) Message-ID: <263@rruxa.UUCP> Date: Tue, 5-May-87 11:15:01 EDT Article-I.D.: rruxa.263 Posted: Tue May 5 11:15:01 1987 Date-Received: Thu, 7-May-87 06:03:30 EDT Organization: Bell Communications Research Lines: 53 Keywords: cheating, honor systems, crock In article <278@herman.UUCP> root@herman.UUCP writes: >In article <83@ksr.UUCP>, benson@alcatraz.ksr.com (Benson Margulies) writes: >> Rather than spending brain-power on defining cheating, writing >> programs to detect it, and arguing about how to punish it, \I/ think >> that you should be spending your time on building a learning >> environment in which its irrelevant. .... > >First of all i have to let out a little school rah-rah: I did my undergraduate >work at the University of Virginia (wah-hoo-wah (:-)) which has a famous (at >least on the east coast) honor system. Essentially, its precepts are: One >does not cheat, and therefore there need be little energy spent on it. One did >not have to worry about covering one's test up in class, etc. >Overall, i would say it worked quite well, and i'm always amazed at "other" >colleges where rampant cheating is accepted as a way of life. At UVA, rampant >honesty is more the norm. > This is a crock. Honor Systems are a joke. I attended Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, NJ my freshman year. At Stevens they also had an honor system. No one proctored the final examinations. You were allowed to leave the examination room and walk around the building during the exam. The only restriction was you couldn't exit the building. Well little old naive me. When I decided that nature had called and I headed to the mens room, I was due for a rude awakening. All that I heard in the bathroom stalls were the sounds of rustling papers and the sound of toilets flushing. People were cheating left and right! Some honor system. Dumb old me. I was honest and I got screwed because of it as compaired to others who cheated and did better on the exam. Obviously, I feel much better about the incident now. I know that the reason for attending a university was for an education, not to get the grade or piece of paper by any means available. However, I do not appreciate the fact that people can get away with this and enter the real world with the approval of a university. It somehow makes my efforts less meaningful. George W. Leach Bell Communications Research New Jersey Institute of Technology 444 Hoes Lane 4A-1129 Computer & Information Sciences Dept. Piscataway, New Jersey 08854 Newark, New Jersey 07102 (201) 699-8639 UUCP: ..!bellcore!{indra | yogi | njitcis}!reggie ARPA: reggie%njit-eies.MAILNET@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA From there to here, from here to there, funny things are everywhere Dr. Seuss "One fish two fish red fish blue fish"