Cheating, or maximizing opportunity?

Parents Forum
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<p>There is this rather pricy tutoring center near our home where several AP science students go for extra help. The tutoring center has the books and materials used in the AP class, and all year they have given the test questions to those in the program a day or two before the test is taken at the high school. Recently, one of the students who went to the tutoring center for the first time (girlfriend took him) realized that these students had the answers ahead of time when he took his first test after his tutor session. He told his parent, who notified the school. The teacher said it was a breach of the honor code. The episode has caused a bit of a stink.</p>

<p>What I find interesting is that people (adults and kids) are not in agreement about whether this is a breach (cheating) or not. What do you think?</p>

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<p>Cheating in ANY form is cheating - no matter how you define it.</p>

<p>I agree that this action is a definite breach of the honor code - big time!!!!!</p>

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<p>That was my response. Duh. </p>

<p>Yet I had lunch with a friend today who said she didn't consider this cheating. She blamed the teacher for using the tests in the AP textbook instead of creating her own.
What's so strange (and pathetic) is that the kids going to tutoring are exceptionally bright kids - A students, with and probably without such a crutch.</p>

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<p>Exceptionally bright but morally bankrupt. Intelligence has little to do with integrity; a lesson that these kids have yet to learn, and perhaps their parents?</p>

<p>How is this tutoring center getting the actual tests? Are they representing themselves as a school to the college board people and using the students who sign up as their student body?</p>

<p>I also want to know how many of these kids are represented on these boards flaunting their high GPAs and elite college plans? They are scum. Sorry, I despise cheaters from the age of reason up.</p>

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<p>THat is definetly cheating, agree with the above post</p>

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<p>I think the teacher needs to bear some if not most of the responsibility. The teacher should not be so lazy as to just copy problems from readily available review books. The AP books are there for anyone to use and practice from.</p>

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<p>How aware were the students that the test questions in the tutoring sessions were identical to those that would be on the school tests? What I mean is, did the teacher tell them, "You can't miss - this is the same test you'll be seeing in school two days from now?" Was the class marketed to students and parents as a means of taking the actual tests in advance? Or was everyone but the teacher essentially clueless about it? If so, I'd say that the teacher was culpable for cheating on the first test, but that the kids should have figured out what was going on and come forward on subsequent tests if the questions were the same.</p>

<p>Might these have been questions from previous AP tests, as Marite asks above? In that case, I see no cheating (but some regrettable laziness on the part of the teacher). Reviewing questions from previous tests is a time-honored means of studying, not cheating. In our school system, kids frequently access past Regents exams and AP tests online (entirely legitimately and with the school's encouragement) in order to review.</p>

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<p>I think that some of you are getting a little carried away here. Calling these kids morally bankrupt and scum? Please, a little maturity. As Marite says, this is more a problem with the teacher than these kids, in my opinion. Your concerns should be focussed toward the school, not the tutoring center, and certainly not toward to the kids! Review book tests are available for most standardized tests across the country. This is hardly cheating.</p>

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<p>"That was my response. Duh. </p>

<p>Yet I had lunch with a friend today who said she didn't consider this cheating. She blamed the teacher for using the tests in the AP textbook instead of creating her own.
What's so strange (and pathetic) is that the kids going to tutoring are exceptionally bright kids - A students, with and probably without such a crutch."</p>

<p>I don't know if that is cheating. If the sample tests are in the textbook (which your friend has to have for the class) or they are on a website that is mentioned in the textbook, then how is that cheating if your friend looks at them to help her study? I see websites mentioned on the back of textbooks all the time--usually they say "student companion site" or something like that and they have exercises to help prepare students for tests.</p>

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<p>"I think the teacher needs to bear some if not most of the responsibility. The teacher should not be so lazy as to just copy problems from readily available review books. The AP books are there for anyone to use and practice from."</p>

<p>I agree. It's like I already said in my other post--there are companion websites that go with textbooks that are listed in or on the back of many textbooks. I don't see how going to the site and looking at the sample tests is cheating. Some textbooks even have mini quizzes at the end of each chapter. If the teacher doesn't want the students to look at this stuff to help themselves study, then they shouldn't have put it in the tutoring center or request to have the materials removed.</p>

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<p>I'm also in agreement with Marite. If the teacher is giving tests from publicly available material, than he/she has to expect that the students might see it. If AP provides it to tutoring centers, then it must be assumed that they expect that tutored students will be viewing it.</p>

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<p>A.S.A.P. -- I guess I"m not sure I'm following exactly what all the parties are doing here. The HS AP teacher and this tutor have the same books -- but are these publicly available books? Could an ambitious student buy the same book off the shelf and accomplish the same thing as the tutor? If the HS teacher and the tutor are using the exact same book, and both are just using the sample tests in that book, and if they are going at about the same pace, then of course the students are going to see the same test more than once. Did the tutor know it was happening -- your original message doesn't really say? </p>

<p>The HS teacher, IMHO, needs to be a little more creative and use or create some different tests (and if the teacher still just insists on using "canned" tests rather than create something, there are a lot of AP study guides with sample questions that he/she could mix and match from). </p>

<p>Having said that, if this happened all the time, the students should have spoken up earlier to let both the teacher and the tutor know what was going on. That way, the teacher could have taken some steps to avoid the problem.</p>

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<p>"Having said that, if this happened all the time, the students should have spoken up earlier to let both the teacher and the tutor know what was going on. That way, the teacher could have taken some steps to avoid the problem."</p>

<p>I'm sure how it is a problem. I don't see that as cheating. Then again, the OP did not exact explain everything. Even if the teacher did not tell them that these sample tests were available as study aides, I still do not think it would be cheating. You cannot help what you come across in attempting to learn the material.</p>

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<p>ASAP, where did the tutoring center get the tests? Is the center connected with the school?</p>

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<p>The circumstances don't seem quite clear. If the tutoring center is using publicly available materials that's okay, and pretty much how tutoring centers prepare kids for tests--by practicing on real ones or ones that mimic the pattterns of real ones. If the teacher at school is esclusively using canned tests, then, as other posters have said, she is being somewhat uncreative and even lazy. Ideally, someone would have spoken up up sooner, when a student first realized the duplication; it sounds as though students who went to the expensive tutoring center were in on the teacher's secret even if he/she didn't realize they were onto it. so it seems thre was an ethical breach in that respect--reluctance on the students' part to give up an advantage they must have realized they had, and carelessness, laziness, or indifference on the teacher's part. (I am assuming no deliberate collusion between the tutoring center and the teacher or students.) It's all pretty cynical and I guess is taking the usual advantages of test-prepping to an extreme that maybe isn't quite cheating but somehow doesn't feel right.</p>

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<p>What marite said. ~berurah</p>

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<p>To the OP: are you saying the teacher told the students that those specific questions would be on that weekend's test? Or was it random that in using old tests for review that some of those questions were recycled? Does the collegeboard recycle old tests or did the teacher have access to what would be on the test ahead of time?</p>

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<p>A few questions to understand the situation? The private tutoring center had the exact same teaching materials (the sudents' text, the teacher's text, the solutions manual and lab manual?), was this by coincidence or did they know or were told ahead of time which instructional manuals were to be used?</p>

<p>For example, DS had 1 calculus book for AP Calc AB in the fall (he's on 4x4 block) and they have a different text for AP Calc BC now, spring term. The Calc book for fall was the book the use at the major 4 year uni close by. The NEW Calc book is one that was specifically written and published solely for the AP Test. Said so right in the book's foreword and at the book publisher's website. And it covers both AP Calc AB and BC tests. At the website, the STUDENT can purchase additional materials, which includes a solutions manual to all homework problems in the book, a strategy guide for how to practice for the AP test and a book of sample tests with the answers. It is made specifically for the student's to purchase. There are also additional materials for the instructor's use, power point slides, handouts, more sample tests....</p>

<p>And if one were running a tutoring center you would be eligible to buy all of it. Son also has AP Chem, AP stats, AP Euro, AP Engli and depending on the text the school purchases these supplemental materials are available to all students and teachers.</p>

<p>The person who wrote the Calc book, re-wrote the AP Calc test for this May, that is why the school switched texts. I know the AP Bio text that is recommended by AP also has all the additional materials.</p>

<p>In the case of OP's school sounds like the tutoring center had the supplemental materials available for purchase from the publisher and it just so happened the teacher used the same sample tests. Its not hard to determine, just look inside the text and it refer you to the book's website.</p>

<p>As far as having tests viewed a ahead of time I know my DD who is a junior in college now as a science major has classes this term where both her O-chem prof and econ prof make available tests from several years ago with the correct answers to the tests. They keep them on file in their offices. So when she doesn't understand a particular problem set, she can pull up the test, show her prof and he helps explain it. I don't think her O-Chem teacher thinks he is cheating. Sometimes the questions are exactly the same, sometimes the variables are changed and sometimes it is an entirely new question.</p>

<p>But the key is the prof/teacher would take the time to generate a new test, with a new answer key and would not be just handing out tests he did not originally make nor have figured out the answers for himself. Now that would be cheating. Cheating the students out of a teacher who really knew their stuff. Especially, AP Chem, AP Physics and AP Calc.</p>

<p>Kat</p>

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<p>"The circumstances don't seem quite clear. If the tutoring center is using publicly available materials that's okay, and pretty much how tutoring centers prepare kids for tests--by practicing on real ones or ones that mimic the pattterns of real ones. If the teacher at school is esclusively using canned tests, then, as other posters have said, she is being somewhat uncreative and even lazy. Ideally, someone would have spoken up up sooner, when a student first realized the duplication; it sounds as though students who went to the expensive tutoring center were in on the teacher's secret even if he/she didn't realize they were onto it. so it seems thre was an ethical breach in that respect--reluctance on the students' part to give up an advantage they must have realized they had, and carelessness, laziness, or indifference on the teacher's part. (I am assuming no deliberate collusion between the tutoring center and the teacher or students.) It's all pretty cynical and I guess is taking the usual advantages of test-prepping to an extreme that maybe isn't quite cheating but somehow doesn't feel right."</p>

<p>So, as an example, if I go to a website that is on the back of textbook and study the sample questions on that site to help me prepare for a test, and magically the teacher ends up using those same questions on a real test--is that cheating? I'm still not convinced that this was cheating.</p>

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<p>
[quote]
The tutoring center has the books and materials used in the AP class, and all year they have given the test questions to those in the program a day or two before the test is taken at the high school.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>The story is not very clear, but I just cannot see any cheating going on. Most books, tests, etc. are available for individual purchase, if one knows who to call, and is willing to pay the (pretty steep) price. If the "Honor Code" actually involved signing at the time of purchase of the books, that the material was only for the use of teachers at a H.S., well then, yes, it has been broken. (Some educational material is for teachers only, and one would have to provide special codes in order to purchase; and many of these books have tests ready to roll out) If this was not the case,it looks like the HS teacher needs to put in more effort into creating the tests, or mix up her sources, as she has been found out.</p>