<p>@Agent of Sense - Exactly. And in continuing to cheat, this student will screw over tons of innocent peers, fellow applicants for jobs, etc...</p>
<p>I just don't see what about this situation would make it ok to ignore the problem.</p>
<p>you should definitely report him (as someone said, "anonymously", so you won't be held accountable for your good deeds) </p>
<p>yes, this is definitely the right thing to do, especially if a school like Yale just accepted a lying sneak instead of a legit, hardworking student</p>
<p>THEY WILL NOT LEARN THEIR LESSON IF YOU DON'T TELL THE TEACHERS</p>
<p>I am URGING you to screw him over, so to speak, which, in this case, is the RIGHT THING TO DO, since he has no right to cheat his way into a top tier school like that</p>
<p>alright hope everything turns out well</p>
<p>"There's no way this is true. You're saying that throughout your whole entire academic career your school has never requested your parents consent to do things like use photographs of you in school publications,"</p>
<p>No. The forms they submit at the beginning of the year through mail cover all this.</p>
<p>"give you aspirin if you have a headache,</p>
<p>I've never needed medical assistance, so I wouldn't know.</p>
<p>"take you on a field trip,"</p>
<p>By mail, taken care of at the beginning of the year.</p>
<p>"ensure that you and your parents are aware of the school's discipline policy,"</p>
<p>Mail, before school starts.</p>
<p>"allow you to participate in science lab or a team sport, etc., right?"</p>
<p>No science lab signature necessary, that was on the part of the student. I fence, so no issue there.</p>
<p>"Also, in case you didn't know this either you can't go on the field trip and then turn in the permission slip later."</p>
<p>Presumably the permission slips are due before the day of the field trip. In Middle School (a huge public one), the teachers would assign deadlines far in advance of the actual deadline so that if a student forgot, then he could just turn it in the next day, an option that few chose.</p>
<p>"You have have to have parental consent before you go not after."</p>
<p>Really? I had no idea...</p>
<p>"Are you homeschooled or something?"</p>
<p>No. I attend a private, day high school. I attended a public middle school.</p>
<p>"You just said the reason why you can't say whether you would turn in xbankx for forging his or her permission slip is because you haven't experienced such a situation."</p>
<p>I've never experienced it directly or indirectly. I can't even imagine it happening. Even hypothetically, it is incomprehensible to me.</p>
<p>"Well, have you been in the OP's or his friend's position before?"</p>
<p>His situation isn't hypothetical. It happened. That's the difference. He explained every facet of it. It is fleshed out, a thing that is as tangible as possible without seeing it or feeling it. It's not a contrived scenario quickly thought up by someone who didn't realize that it was completely irrelevant. I can't even speak about what I would do because the situation is just not something I would imagine happening at all. If someone came up and explained all the specifics as much as possible, then I could formulate some opinion about what to do. But that didn't happen.</p>
<p>Please think before you type, and stop trying to corner people. ;) It's not working.</p>
<p>One question: If Yale had found out that he had forged the recs while reading his application, would they have accepted him in the first place?</p>
<p>collegebound, thanks for giving us the update! The teachers sound like they know exactly what they are doing, and they are doing it efficiently and well! Please keep us posted!</p>
<p>Collegebound09, thanks for telling us what the teachers have chosen to do. I think they are doing the right thing. But if they hadn't done anything, I think at that point you have fulfilled your moral and ethical obligations. Going beyond that would have devolved into meddling in my opinion.</p>
<p>And Baelor, I have agreed with much of what you have posted throughout. I share your view on what's right and wrong here. Where I differ from you is where you minimized the relevance of xbankx and xxxboy's offering different hypotheticals. Posing the hypotheticals is a great way to explore where you share common ground divining exactly where the point of contention is. Let's face it, we all have our level of hypocrisy we're willing to accept for ourselves. Well, maybe hypocrisy is too strong a word. A better phrase would be "tipping point."</p>
<p>^ Oh, right. Hypothetical situations can be useful is presented correctly. But the OP's situation was hardly simple. So I don't know how answering a hypothetical question that has little context would be useful.</p>
<p>Let me try:</p>
<p>In the situation of the forged parent's signature, I would attempt to convince said person not to forge in the first place. I have never been in a situation where a child has had to present that signature IMMEDIATELY. All forms that need to be signed by parents in my life have been ones that do not concern me, so are sent by mail. Anyway, I would try to find a situation in which the signature can be obtained, or the parent faxes the form in to the school (something I have done), or faxes or emails a note to the principal. These have all been acceptable. Even if the student has forged the signature already but has not yet turned it in, I would suggest to him that he try an alternative. I would not turn him in.</p>
<p>If, however, he insisted on turning the form in, the decision would be tougher. I would have presumably tried to convince him to do otherwise. If he refuses to listen, then I would probably let the teacher know later.</p>
<p>Is this an adequate response?</p>
<p>^I think so. Because it's yours. It reveals more depth of where your "tipping point" is. That's the point of hypotheticals, at least to me. I agree with your position on OP and what he should have done (and, indeed, did) though I initially proposed speaking with the cheater directly. The interesting part for me, then, is to explore where we diverge. Conversely, it is interesting to see where xbankx and xxxboy and I converge. </p>
<p>Under the "forged parent's signature" hypothetical, I would not have intervened if the forgery was only to allow him to go on a field trip he would have been permitted to attend anyway. As an adult I would recommend another remedy than forgery, but as his classmate I would have not have intervened. To me that's interesting because we shared a view on OP's dilemma but differ on this hypothetical.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Is this an adequate response?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Yes.</p>
<p>But what a SNITCH! I suggest you take the dgaf approach like an earlier poster suggested.</p>
<p>But the issue is completely inconsequential in all likelihood, I agree. The forgery is more important. However, I don't think that he should be lying to the school and teacher. To be honest, a phone call from the parents saying it's fine was enough for even my strictest teachers in middle school in the rare event (like once in three years) that a parental signature was required.</p>
<p>There was one time, in seventh grade, when we were given progress reports. I had an A in math, but forgot to have my parents sign it. They wouldn't have cared. I chose not to forge and got lunch detention. I still don't regret my choice, although the consequences weren't important.</p>
<p>"But what a SNITCH! I suggest you take the dgaf approach like an earlier poster suggested."</p>
<p>I suggest that you let me live my life. If it is as absurd as you claim, then I should snap out of it. In the meantime, let me learn from my apparent mistakes and let me realize in time that my mentality is completely bogus. Or not, depending. ;)</p>
<p>"But what a SNITCH! I suggest you take the dgaf approach like an earlier poster suggested."</p>
<p>o________o</p>
<p>This attitude causes a lot problems in the world. Everyone from victims of bullying to victims of genocide would be a lot better off if people would quit labeling everything "snitching" and deciding to not gaf because it's not convenient to be morally implicated in the situation.</p>
<p>Baelor:</p>
<p>HAHAHA!</p>
<p>Chill out man. I was kidding...</p>
<p>
[quote]
I chose not to forge and got lunch detention. I still don't regret my choice, although the consequences weren't important.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>That's the right thing to do.</p>
<p>Oh, I'm pretty calm. I got no sleep last night, so I'm not that excitable today.</p>
<p>But I was completely serious. My views and perspective have changed drastically since freshman year, and they will continue to shift in college (I hope in a way they do, that way I can be sure I'm being challenged and stimulated). We'll see where they end up. Who knows, I may be agreeing with you in four or five years. But I would even dare to predict the changes. Our views are shaped by our experiences, so I will be looking forward to new ones in college.</p>
<p>So, any predictions on what OP is going to report as to what happens? </p>
<p>To restate the obvious to anyone who has been paying attention (I'm watching the Olympics, where restating the obvious is rampant), OP contacted the 4 teachers in whose names he understood Yalecheater forged rec letters. Two said they didn't write him one. The other two said they wrote rec letters for Yalecheater, who did not waive the right to read them. This meant that they each turned the rec letter over to Yalecheater to mail. This means that Yalecheater had the opportunity to substitute a rec letter of his own authorship. The teachers have said they are going to contact Yale and compare the letters they wrote with what Yalecheater actually submitted to Yale. </p>
<p>So we are in suspense until we know what happens. Will it be:</p>
<ol>
<li>The letters match, so no cheating was done; or </li>
<li>The letters don't match, which means Yalecheater is in fact a cheater and the world's biggest d<em>mb</em>ss for not keeping his mouth shut.</li>
</ol>
<p>If it's 2., what will the punishment be? And, how many more pages will this thread go if he gets his acceptance revoked? And, finally, should OP feel responsible for "ruining his life" as many have suggested (I personally say no, YC did that for himself). </p>
<p>I will go out on a limb and say it's 1. I think the letters will match. If those teachers actually wrote recs for a student who was otherwise good enough for Yale to accept, they must have been favorable recommendations. It makes no sense that YC would feel the need to alter favorable recs. </p>
<p>And if the letters match, it's no harm and no foul and OP can be proud he did the right thing.</p>
<p>Ur Pretty Mean If U Turned Him.. As Bad As He Is.... U Dont Do That....</p>
<p>^ I think he did. :p</p>
<p>Anyway, laxtaxi, I agree and hope that you are correct. I really hope this guy didn't forge his recs, and I hope that his acceptance to Yale is intact (because he didn't cheat on his app). I think the letters will match. But then one question remains unanswered:</p>
<p>Why did he say that different people wrote the recs to different students? It doesn't make any sense. Why on earth would someone do that? His statement that he forged them could be seen as sarcasm, especially if the recs weren't forged. But the other thing is confusing...</p>
<p>I think he was just sorta angry and was just joking. Also he could have been planning on using certain teachers and then changed his mind at the last minute (so instead of explaining that fact to the OP he said he forged them). Maybe he used those teachers for scholarships, other colleges, or something and got confused. There are myriad reasons I guess. But yeah, I'm erring on the side of he didn't forge them. Though the kid will be looked at closer I can imagine when he attends Yale even though he didn't cheat originally.</p>
<p>
[quote]
1. The letters match, so no cheating was done.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I agree with Cervantes on this. It seems a lot less likely that any wrongdoing was done by this student. (However, the OP may be guilty of some wrongdoing. OP, you better question why you cared so much about this especially now that there is so little for anyone to gain from your reporting this...)</p>
<p>Again kids, this is why the dgaf/the God and karma will take care of this approach would have been more appropriate than the "moral crusader" approach. So little evidence, so little for anyone to gain--except the OP getting revenge for something--that it makes so little sense for the OP to risk sullying his own and the student's reputations.</p>
<p>Also kids, make sure you don't friend snitches and haters.</p>
<p>
[quote]
This attitude causes a lot problems in the world. Everyone from victims of bullying to victims of genocide would be a lot better off if people would quit labeling everything "snitching" and deciding to not gaf because it's not convenient to be morally implicated in the situation.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Why would the dgaf lifestyle encourage bullying or genocide? If you dgaf, you wouldn't bother to bully people or commit genocide in the first place. All of the people that engage in bullying or genocide obviously gaf about what they are doing. </p>
<p>That said, there are times when dgaf followers have to gaf; however, the OP's situation is not one of those.</p>
<p>No offense, but this thread is going way too fast for any reasonable person to follow... to get your name is an amazing feat, to say the least. Only people who have absolutely nothing better to do than to chat with strangers online all day can accomplish...</p>
<p>Here are the top ten posters on this thread:</p>
<p>Baelor ...........73
Newjack88 .....30
zzzboy ..........28
laxtaxi ...........24
Cervantes ......22
xbankx ..........19
screwitlah ......15
Northstarmom .11
galoisien ........11
Bay ..............10</p>
<p>this will be my third, and probably final post in this thread.</p>
<p>"so little for anyone to gain from your reporting this"</p>
<p>...Why does that matter? Do you personally have to gain something in order for you to agree that any action is moral? No one lost anything either -except for those who spent way too much time trying to prove that their personal ethical views are correct - so why criticize the effort? </p>
<p>I personally hope that this kid didn't forge his recs, and that's pretty much how I think it will turn out, but that fact doesn't mean that caring about the issue in the first place was stupid. </p>
<p>"Why would the dgaf lifestyle encourage bullying or genocide? If you dgaf, you wouldn't bother to bully people or commit genocide in the first place. All of the people that engage in bullying or genocide obviously gaf about what they are doing."</p>
<p>In my examples, I'm talking about how people get away with bullying or genocide because others refuse to gaf, not about the gaf-ness of the bully/despot.</p>
<p>...I do not know how to make the above sentence less lol-inducing. o_O</p>