Cheating 2.0: Technology Blurs and Redefines Integrity in Schools
In early September, Harvard University was rocked by a cheating scandal and the media took to their (online) soap boxes to engage in everyone’s favorite activity, Harvard bashing. But large-scale cheating is neither new nor isolated in the highly competitive Ivy League. Rather, the ubiquity of connective technology is making cheating much more accessible and commonplace — a fact that injects ambiguity into a long-held parable of integrity above all.
At Stuyvesant High School, “New York City’s flagship public school”, 71 students were found exchanging test answers through text-messages this past June, but most students involved say they don’t feel their integrity had been compromised. The pressure to succeed has grown exponentially in recent years as acceptance rates to universities across the country have plummeted. But it’s the change in the how we communicate that has truly altered the moral code. For many students, technology has catalyzed cheating by offering a fast, effective, and widely accepted method for searching for solutions and collaborating on tests. Cell phones are banned at Stuyvesant, but the myriad of uses for smartphones makes the policy unpopular (I can’t text my friend to meet for lunch?). ‘“Writing on your hand, that’s kiddie stuff,” said Melissa,’ a senior. Ever ingenuitive, today’s students find a way to tailor technology to fit their needs. “Many classes have private Facebook groups that students use to exchange advice or, sometimes, to post full sets of answers for classmates to copy. Take-home exams are seen as an invitation to work together” (Stuyvesant Students Describe the How and Why of Cheating, New York Times). Facebook, cell-phones, and other connective technologies amplify and encourage the growth of tight-knit networks of people with common goals and insights; in schools, this effect manifests itself as even weak ties between students are viewed as possibilities for ‘collaboration’.
A vicious cycle is born, and the principles that have made Facebook and Twitter such grand successes come into play — that is, more cheaters in a network means more collective success and less individual culpability. What’s more, a student puts himself at a serious disadvantage by not joining the group. He will be measured against his classmates’ numerical accomplishments come application time. It’s a dangerous and explosive formula, and old-school notions of integrity are defenseless, particularly because young people are more adaptive to changes in policy and technology than most administrators.
At Stuyvesant, the new principal has announced a crackdown on the use of laptops and iPads during the day, along with a redoubling of efforts to ban cellphones. Still, it might not be enough. The culture has changed, one Stuyvesant senior says. “If you ask people, they’d say it’s not cheating. I have your back, you have mine.”
-jeh366