Though cheating may be the worry of many educators and students, the strange fact is, it is not all that rare. According to www.stanford.edu, cheating is defined as, “representing someone else’s work as your own” and states that cheating has increased in the past 50 years. Also surprising to some is the report that the most avid cheaters are above average, college-bound students.
For years, the common theory on cheating was “… people who are lazy [cheat],” as junior Alex Wasdon said. “It’s people who don’t value school enough and would rather use other people’s work.” However, even with the traditional stance on cheating deeply rooted in the minds of pupils and teachers, www.standford.edu still reports that, “73 percent of all test takers, including prospective graduate students and teachers agree that most students do cheat at some point and 86 percent of high school students agreed.”
Some may feel like cheating has increased, others believe cheating is not new, and that it’s only recently that people feel free to admit it.
“I could see some people justifying cheating because of some successful people who cheat,” junior Rachel Forrest said. “However, I’d still be nervous to cheat … it’s probably better to just do your own thing and get some sure points than to risk it with cheating.”
Therefore, the question for many is why cheating has become so commonplace, and how people feel justified to manipulate their way through school.
“In my experience … those on the higher end [of achievement] feel the pressure to perform and get every single thing in and are therefore more likely to be susceptible to … cheating,” Advanced Placement World teacher Katherine Sasser said.
With students feeling such a need to succeed, many become numb to the once commonplace stigma associated with cheating. For some, a rather recent debacle at Harvard in which more than half of a class was caught cheating on a take-home test, may be evidence of such a sentiment. However, for many, even when pushing themselves to their limit, cheating may be the only way to gain an edge.
“[Students] are involved in [so much], it’s just not possible to maintain success, and so sometimes cheating becomes reality because they can’t do all that they want to,” Sasser said.
In fact, history is riddled with successful masters of self-propagation and deceit. From George Washington’s violations of the sanctity of Christmas when crossing the Delaware, to Henry-the-XIII’s fondness of new wives, despite the fact that divorce was illegal at the time, all these figures were able to successfully accomplish their goals despite them being against tradition.
Many might say the only reason history remembers these violations is because these people were public figures. But one could argue that they are only remembered because of their successful violations of social norms.
“I think that there is an emphasis on [cheating],” junior Emily Kinkade said. “There is an idea in … society that you should be successful without having to try as hard.”
Another layer to cheating could be that lines are blurred for students. Some classes encourage cooperation, collaboration and discussion through group projects. On the other hand, there are classes in which collaboration is difficult. For many students, these disparaging differences between class etiquettes add to the confusion as to where the boundaries of cheating begin and end.
“Collaboration’s the willful sharing of an idea,” Wasdon said, “whereas cheating is the stealing of those ideas without permission.”
While all of this may sound simple, one should consider, the non-omnipotent power which must try their best to monitor the activities in their classes. For many teachers, the task of monitoring can be too great.
“Coming from a language arts and social studies perspective, when you look at writing, often times students … have a lot of commonalities and similarities, so it’s difficult to say which is and isn’t cheating,” Sasser said. “If I give an essay prompt and students talk about it beforehand, then they have similar ideas in thesis and arguments, I wouldn’t say that, that is cheating.”
However, even truly collaborating students find it unclear when it is or isn’t OK to share ideas.
“I feel like those classes that don’t have a lot of collaboration might need to collaborate more, but it might also make more people cheat,” Forrest said. “I think when people collaborate it is easier to cheat even if it’s by accident because everyone is talking. Individually, it stands out more.”
Overall, the prominence of cheating may shock people, while some may view it as the only way to get by, which for many, justifies the cheating. However, something relatively new lies within our culture that may worry some, especially educators.
“I think that our society has taught students … that things should come easily,” Sasser said. “I really think that something is seriously wrong with that message to kids because to become better, you have to be challenged.”
 
By Ross Parks