My Psy 320 grad student teacher has brought me up on formal charges for cheating. I was 6 weeks away from graduation and she says my answers, some word for word and some not, are all from wikipedia or other internet sites. She said another student said I was looking down alot and she noticed it also. So when I returned to class the next week she made me retake the test. She says I used my phone to cheat. I admit I did have my phone on and with me during the 2nd exam but my son kept texting me because we had had a huge fight that day. I am 50 years old and know better that to have my phone but I swear on my mothers grave I didnt use it to cheat. It’s true my answers would come from online due to the fact I couldnt afford a $279 text book. Im a single mother with no child support coming in. I have sacrificed so much to finally have some kind of future. The professor is recommending failure of the class and expulsion. I’ve never been accused of anything remotely like this and cannot, for the life of me, gather my thoughts to write out the appeal due at midnight tonight. I get that this looks bad but Im not a shady person and it never dawned on me my actions would be considered as such. Please help me! Any advice? I havent a clue how to prove I wasnt and if an “Alford Plea” was available I see how it would appear I was cheating but I didnt!! This is my future we are talking about! I lost my home and family in a fire and this, as pitiful as it is, is all I have to really look forward to in the 2nd half of my life!
Do you go to a school with a large non-traditional student population? My University has a large non-trad population and professors seem to be relatively conscious of some of the challenges that non-trads face that your typical 19 year old doesn’t. But if you’re a small minority at your school, perhaps the faculty aren’t as acutely aware of these challenges.
Tell your professor (or whomever you’re writing the appeal to) the truth. Without going into explicit detail, say that you had an important family matter and your son was trying to get into contact with you - hence the reason you kept noticing your phone going off with text messages.
I’m not entirely sure how to address the whole Wikipedia matter; the only thing that is problematic is the verbatim agreement between Wikipedia and your answers. Plenty of students use Wikipedia to supplement their learning - sometimes when I space out in class and I miss what the professor said about XYZ, I check up on it through Wikipedia while studying for exams. You can’t be penalized, per se, for not buying the textbook. My school recently did a survey and reported that up to 27% of students have taken courses and did not (for any number of reasons) buy the related course materials.
Do you need to pass this specific class to graduate? Do you still have time to withdraw? (Some schools haven’t had their withdrawal deadline yet!) Is there any way you could bargain with the professor to just take an F on the exam? Or an F in the course but no expulsion?
I sincerely wish you the best of luck.
How do you explain that you wrote down word-for-word descriptions on the internet during the test? Even if you had been studying using online information, your answers would have been written in your own words.
My students tell me or ask me in advance when they have to use their phones during an exam because they have forgotten their calculators… Then they seem to make very little use of the phone, except (I assume) to do a few calculations.
Perhaps you could offer to show your professors the texts received during the exam to prove that they were happening.
Preamble1776 thank you for replying to my post it is much appreciated. I attend a satellite campus with the main campus about an hour away. There are more non-trads at our campus than on the main one for sure. This is an grad student teacher, very young, and Ive felt an attitude from her from day one maybe, possibly, due to my age but I cant say for sure. ChedercheeseMN she told me it was word for word but I wasn’t allowed to see my answers to know which ones she was speaking of. If they were very short ones, it is entirely possible to be word for word (or nearly) as I have a terrific short-term memory but long-term, not so much. Anyway I guess Ive just gotten comfortable with having my phone on as I rarely get calls/texts during class but that day we had had a major blow-out and my son is 18 (a senior in high school) and doesnt have much self control when he is upset about something. Anyway, I have to write a short letter addressing what happened that day and turn it in shortly. I want to stay on point but Im so upset about the ramifications should they actually vote for expulsion.
Thank you both for responding!
How did you do on the retake? How can you take a class without the textbook? That is part of the cost of takign a class…or you buy a used one or see if there is one on reserve at the library. Your words on a test were word for word from wikipedia? Did you learn the material?
I wish you luck handling this. It’s too late to help but one thing that stuck out to me in your story is that the teacher accusing you was a grad student. Hopefully, that teacher asked for advice and guidance before taking such an extreme position. She probably has very little experience with these kinds of issues and furthermore, at that stage, there often can be a feeling of needing to prove oneself. Along with that may very well be an inability to identify with Non-traditional students (grad students are often over-achievers, some who go K-20 in one shot). In other words, there are many reasons she may be handling the situation poorly. Otoh it seems like it’s logical to have you re-take the exam and accept that grade. If that went poorly, then I could see why your explanation is questionable. I wish you luck! Being a mom while going to school is a very admirable challenge!
Rarely. I have photographic memory, and it’s easier to recall an exact definition than to recall the exact definition and translate that into my own words.
One wonders if you understand the material if you can’t put it into your own words.
Also if you are taking it from wikipedia (1) a questionable source) and don’t cite it (2) Plagiarism it does not look good.