<p>I'm an engineering major and I have cheated before whether it's using a ti89 or old tests or my phone during a test it happens. Just wondering if anyone else has done this? Engineering is hard and sometimes I wonder if everything I learn will even be useful in my life, that's why I resort to cheating sometimes</p>
<p>Don’t cheat. As the old expression goes; “you are only cheating yourself”.</p>
<p>Engineering school can be tough and it is tempting to cheat. Looking at old tests is not cheating in my book, you still have to learn the material and the old tests are just more material to help you learn. The professor should be changing the tests enough to make the new test a true test of your knowledge. </p>
<p>You are in engineering school to accomplish two basic things. </p>
<p>1) Learn the basics. </p>
<p>2) Learn how to learn</p>
<p>As hard as you might think engineering school is, the real world can be tougher. If you haven’t learned how to learn, you won’t do very well in your career. 30 years working in the lower rungs of engineering isn’t very fun. You want to keep learning and then applying what you have learned. The job becomes more fun and the money follows. DON’T CHEAT YOURSELF.</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>30 years working in the lower rungs of engineering isn’t very fun.</p>
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<p>Not really sure what the “lower rungs of engineering” means. My H is a test engineer. He loves his job. He could have become a manager, but he actually enjoys engineering … and although the BIG money hasn’t followed, we are certainly far from poor. Oh, and he does consider what he does “fun.” </p>
<p>I went to an engineering school. Only a very few students cheated, although we did use old tests to study. It’s really hard to handle upper level courses when you haven’t mastered lower level material … and you can’t cheat in every situation, so you have to know your stuff. If you really want to be an engineer, you have to study like crazy (unless you’re one of the brilliant ones - I certainly knew some of them!). There is no easy way to do it.</p>
<p>Why study engineering? I have a story if 2 cheaters who thought they were too hot to go to CSU. One got kicked out of one UC, came to my school, slept with one older professor, not rumor, she told me, had a child out of wedlock not with the professor but with some technician at work. Last I’ve heard she was employed as an engineer but that’s not the kind of life I want to lead. I would study something else. Really trust yourself and your ability. Don’t short change yourself.</p>
<p>Actually, you’re not only cheating yourself. You’re cheating your classmates. If people get higher scores by cheating, the professor may mistakenly believe that he or she has adequately taught the material and that those who didn’t score as well (because they didn’t cheat) need to study a little harder. And you should ask yourself if you want to be an engineer, or if you just want the engineering degree.</p>
<p>I certainly hope the OP is kidding…and that his cheating isn’t something he thinks is OK. It sounds like he is looking for others who have cheated…and can build a case for saying this is just fine.</p>
<p>It is not fine to cheat. You have been very lucky that you haven’t been caught. Cheating is grounds for dismissal from almost every college I can think of. Colleges and employers…actually most folks…frown on dishonesty.</p>
<p>I should suggest you stop cheating. Find a major where you can do the work all on your own.</p>
<p>Read here on CC about the cheaters who got caught and what happened to them and how bad they felt that they cheated. All engineers (all majors) have to take some courses in areas that are not of specific interest to them…part of the reason is to expose you to many aspects of your major to see if they are of interest and also to give you background in that area. </p>
<p>“Engineering is hard and sometimes I wonder if everything I learn will even be useful in my life, that’s why I resort to cheating sometimes”</p>
<p>A weak justification for a weak action. If for no other purpose, at the very least everything you learn is useful in the pursuit of the degree you are seeking, which will eventually give you substantial benefit in future job prospects and earnings.</p>
<p>@Massmomm speaks the truth: you are not only cheating yourself, you are cheating your classmates. In essence, you are making the work <em>more</em> difficult for those who do not cheat. Your ease begets their difficulty…is that fair?</p>
<p>The honorable thing to do would be to self-report the cheating now before you are caught, suffer the consequences, and cease to do so henceforth. </p>
<p>If you can at least manage the third, that alone would be an act of silent service to your peers.</p>
<p>I hope the engineers who designed the scary “mixmaster” highway overpasses I travel daily didn’t cheat their way through school.</p>
<p>If they allow you to use cell phones during tests, it is not cheating. If you are using one and they are banned, that’s cheating, even if you aren’t caught.</p>
<p>So:
- TI 89 - are they banned? If they aren’t banned, it isn’t cheating. Even if you pre-program them.
- old tests - yes, in general, if a professor does not make old tests available to all students, it is considered cheating to review old tests, especially graded ones. I make it a point to change my questions every semester, but sadly many professors feel it tiresome to actually do work.
- cell phone - if they didn’t ban use of cell phones, or don’t proctor you to see if you are using a cell phone, that’s amazing. I know people expelled from school due to cell phone use on tests. Check your university’s honor code.</p>
<p>It sounds like you should change majors because you don’t like engineering, but I would hazard to guess that you want the money and prestige of being an engineer without the hard work.</p>
<p>No, everyone does not cheat. But the university is somewhat at fault if they aren’t taking steps to decrease/eliminate cheating.</p>
<p>Last year D had a class in which students came up with some clever ways of cheating. Like @massmomm mentioned, it made things difficult for students who did not cheat. Usual students who did well just didn’t because cheating students messed with curve.</p>
<p>My only advice to D was just do the best you can to learn material. You can’t stop unethical behavior in others. </p>
<p>Though I realize students should be trusted to not cheat, professors could hep address the issue by asking that cell phones be left on front desk during tests. (I would go so far as to say student with phone in hand during test be given a failing grade for that exam.) Maybe also requiring classroom calculators be used rather than the students’ own.</p>
<p>Life is hard and if you follow your logic into other areas of said life , then it’s okay to cheat on your girlfriend/boyfriend, falsify records, not pay what you owe, and you get my drift. You’re hurting everyone, you included.</p>
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<p>How often does a professor not do this? Other than when a course is new or just rarely offered, it seems to be very normal that a professor offers previous exams.</p>
<p>I don’t think I’ve had any class that explicitly banned a TI-89. Is there any reason why they would? Can you load pictures into it or something?</p>
<p>I used my cell phone once on a test in airplane mode for one question where I had to do a quick calculation. I usually take my phone in and put it on airplane mode to check the time anyway. One time I wasn’t expecting to need a calculator for the exam, but I had to do a computation for one problem so I just used my phone. Our exams were never proctored, no one cared. I actually remember once someone taking a phone call in an exam (though just to say “Hey man, taking an exam, I’ll call you back when I’m done.”) No one cared. </p>
<p>None of this really seems like cheating.</p>
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You can try. Cheating will never stop if it doesn’t get reported. </p>
<p>Once, after I finished a final exam and was sitting out in the hall, a couple of guys came out of the classroom and asked me about a particular problem. I told them how I’d done it, and then they went back into the classroom to continue the test! I had thought they were finished! I should have told the proctor, but I was so shocked I didn’t do anything. Looking back on it, I’m upset at myself for not reporting them.</p>
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<p>Sigh, being a structural engineer, I often wonder about complicated structures that are designed by the people who barely made it through engineering school. I try not to think about it when I go through skyscrapers! </p>
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<p>Hence the existence of a “duty to report” provision at many schools that have honor codes. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, honor code or not, most students feel the weight of the peer pressure “no one likes a tattler” more strongly than the duty to report misconduct.</p>
<p>I do learn the material I’m just saying sometimes the teacher makes the tests hard for everyone on purpose. And I disagree I won’t use everything I learn in my college classes in my career, so yes student will resort to cheating if they are about to cheat. I know I know I’m cheating myself but really when well I ever use statics in my petroluem engineering career… Everyone saying oh you should report yourself… I’m just trying to get through this material so I can ACTUALLY LEARN SOMETHING THAT WILL HELP ME IN MY CAREER. Cheating happens guys stop acting like you have never done it in your life.</p>
<p>So go ahead and cheat. Why are you coming on an internet forum and trying to justify your wrong behavior? Just don’t come back and complain when you get caught, either sooner or later.</p>
<p>@Suhaib93,</p>
<p>“I know I know I’m cheating myself but really when well I ever use statics in my petroluem engineering career…”</p>
<p>Having been in business for over 30 years, I can tell you that statistics is the one area of math at which I wish more folks were more thoroughly proficient.</p>
<p>Your post makes the point for all the posters telling you that cheating is bad and that you should refrain therefrom.</p>