Would you own up to cheating?

Cheating is one of life’s dirty little secrets at college. It’s common knowledge that it happens frequently in the majority of classes. It’s also just as well known that it is incredibly difficult to discern who the cheaters are. There is no typical profile of a cheater or even similar motivations behind their actions. Some feel too pressured academically and decide cheating is the only way to keep up with their classmates, while others jump on the bandwagon simply because everyone else is doing it.

In the digital age, cheating is easier to do and harder to be caught doing. At college, cheaters are rarely exposed and even more rarely have to face the consequences of their actions. This is incredibly frustrating for many students who genuinely put hard work into earning good grades and have to deal with the knowledge that cheaters may be getting away with doing much less work and getting similar grades.

The cheating epidemic entered the national spotlight in a dramatic way Nov. 1, when UCF professor Richard Quinn started out his lecture with a stunning announcement: The midterms for all 600 students in his class were being thrown out, and every student had to retake a new version. Why? Thanks to a tip from an anonymous student, Quinn realized that electronic copies of the midterm questions had been accessed by more than a third of the students in his course. Quinn and administrators were able to electronically trace the students who had access to the questions and had a list of the 215 students who had cheated. Armed with that knowledge, Quinn stood up and gave a lecture he had hoped he never would have to give.

The video of Quinn’s lecture is spellbinding to watch. He doesn’t scream or rant, as you would think someone would be apt to do in a lecture about this topic. In a firm voice, he calmly informs the class of the cheating scandal and the retaking of the midterm. Then he does something rather unprecedented. He gives the cheaters an ultimatum to fess up to their crime in the next 24 hours, or else their names would be turned in to the Office of Academic Affairs and they would probably face suspension or expulsion. Cheaters who confessed would only have to take a four-hour ethics class to help them better understand the morality of their actions.

After the video of the lecture hit YouTube, Quinn was praised as a hero for his actions. He has received e-mails and calls from all around the world applauding him for standing up and confronting cheating on college campuses head-on. One commenter on the video rather adequately summed up all the praise of Quinn: “Finally, someone with some guts.”

When my mom first told me about this story when it broke two weeks ago, I had just left a psychology lecture on the psychological basis of morality. What I had learned was applicable to the situation: Many people who consider themselves moral do the right thing not because acting immorally troubles their consciences, but rather out of a fear of the consequences of immoral actions. I found it incredibly interesting that Quinn had successfully applied this knowledge to encourage students to do the right thing and confess.

It seems that the majority of people who cheated on the exam were at peace with their actions and had resolved not to confess the misdeed. However, when they were forced to endure the consequences of their actions in the form of Quinn’s ultimatum, 200 out of 215 people on the list of those who supposedly cheated came forward and owned up to their actions rather than face suspension or expulsion from the university.

A poll conducted by The Daily Princetonian in April 2009 showed that 20 percent of undergraduates at Princeton had violated the Honor Code. The true percentage of people who have cheated at Princeton is probably higher, because students may be unwilling to own up to cheating, even in a supposedly anonymous poll. So cheating is definitely not something limited to large public schools like UCF. That is why it is foolish to have an honor code based on our sense of “morality” as Princeton students. Being a Princeton student doesn’t make us any more moral or less prone to cheating than other college students.

So who is supposed to take on the mantle of preventing cheating at Princeton? As Quinn demonstrated, the faculty is a good choice. Professors could take a more active role in being on the lookout for unusual grade distributions or sudden improvements in the quality of student work. This would be particularly useful in foreign language classes, where it is most obvious when a student’s work suddenly improves or appears to demonstrate a much higher proficiency than the student has previously demonstrated.

However, even if the faculty do become active in fighting against cheating, it is not fair to lay the whole burden on their shoulders. As the UCF cheating scandal demonstrated, if students know they will be forced to own up to cheating or face the consequences, many will stand up and admit they had done something wrong. And perhaps, in the end, that will be a more effective moral lesson for cheaters than any ethics course.

Kelsey Zimmerman is a sophomore from Glen Allen, Va. She can be reached at kzimmerm@princeton.edu.