<p>Well, while preparing for midterm, I was browsing the web for some practice questions, and then I found a website where they have some practice questions for my subject. The thing is those practice questions (with answers) turned out to be the homework questions that our prof give us online. </p>
<p>Which means for the next few weeks, I will be getting like perfect score for my homework, and the homework questions are really hard. The last few homework, the average in our class was around 60-70%. Homework is 25% of the grade. My prof. will definitely notice it. But is that considered cheating? It's not like I did something illegal. My prof got his questions in the workbook that supplements the textbook that we are using. </p>
<p>I am really worried. It seems that what I am doing is wrong because it's unfair to the other students. However, I do remember someone asking in class that he found some notes online and that he want's to use it, and if it would be a good supplement for the lecture, and my prof was ok with it. But I also remember my prof saying that he hates cheaters, and that he would embarrass the cheater in front of the class to teach that person a lesson. I am nervous, but you see just typing the title of the textbook in google, shows this site, and it is even in amazon. I'm thinking of buying the workbook too.
In order to be safe, should I just not use it? Please help me, what should I do? Does my prof have the right to be angry and call me a cheater?</p>
<p>So far, I haven't use the answers that I have downloaded in the net, or even ordered the book. The next homework is due 2 weeks from now. Anyway, I should go to his office hour, and tell him that I found where he got his homework questions, then what? </p>
<p>Do you guys think he would give me new sets of homework to make it fair? Would he ask me to not use the answers that I got from the net? Would he change the homework questions and announce it in class that someone got the answers so he has to change it? I don't think he can report me to the dean because I have not done anything yet. Do you guys think it is his fault, for getting the questions from an obvious source? </p>
<p>I was wondering what he will do if I did report it. Maybe he would tell me that it is up to me, and that he won't do anything about it. </p>
<p>But wait. In this homework, we are allowed to work together, we are allowed to share our answers to our classmates as long as we submit our answers individually. So, that means... I am not really cheating, I mean I can pretend that the answers from the net is part of the collaboration or I don't know.</p>
<p>I would consider it cheating to use the website. In general, homework problems that are being graded are to be done <em>by you</em> without outside assistance, and the website would be providing outside assistance.</p>
<p>And if I were teaching your class, I would want to know it was out there.</p>
<p>If I were you, upon realizing that the answers to my homework assignment were on that website, I would have (a) closed my browser window, and (b) gone to the professor to say that I had found this website with a search engine but was not using the answers while I was doing my homework.</p>
<p>I would suggest that if you haven't used the answers, you get rid of them and notify the professor that you found them.</p>
<p>I would like to think that he would simply change future assignments, but the reality is that a lot of professors have difficulty coming up with problem sets that work well for homework in their fields, and so they use sets that are commercially available. So he might just go right on using these, or switch to another source (the answers to which would also show up online). If he just thanked you for your honesty and continued using problem sets from this source, I would expect him to pay attention to whether you seemed a lot more skilled on unproctored homework assignment than on proctored tests -- which most professors do anyway -- because that's really what will tell him whether you are getting help on the problems. I would also expect him to be more aware for the rest of the semester of whether other people seem to be better at problems on homework assignments than problems on tests.</p>
<p>One consolation a lot of professors have when it comes to people cheating on homework is that the homework is really where they expect you to get your practice, and people who cheat on homework are likely to do less well on tests than people who don't because they're not getting the same benefit from the homework that others do.</p>
<p>I think that if you notify him that you've found the answers and you don't use them, you are likely to make a very good impression on him. On the other hand, if you do really well on homework assignments but not on tests, he's likely to suspect you of cheating even if he can't prove it.</p>
<p>Your main goal in this class is to learn the material, so definitely use the answers to your advantage in making sure you understand the homework problems, so you may do well on the tests as well. Now as far as using the answers to get high marks on your homework, you should check your class syllabus about the homework policy. If the professor allows you to consult each other and work in groups on homework problems (which is quite common at my university, I'm not sure about yours), then I say you should put some effort into the homework and then check what you got with the answer on the workbook you found. If you got it wrong, understand why it is wrong and re-do the problem. </p>
<p>If your professor states on the syllabus that you're not to consult any resources, however, I would still use the answers to make sure I understand the homework, but actually changing the answers would be considered "cheating" in that case.</p>
<p>I think you're home free. Another kid doing the same thing as you (or similar) described it to the prof, who said it was OK. Also, the prof chooses what to assign you, and he chose to assign something that had a supplement workbook online. I think you're fine. It's not like you're buying test answers over the black market.</p>
<p>Oftentimes, schools actually sell solution manuals for homework -- which is basically what this site is. Use it to check your homework but not to copy from it. If you are unsure about what the professor would think, ask him. Tell him you found a site with solutions to the hw problems assigned and are wondering what he thinks of using that as a learning aid. <em>As long as you are doing the work yourself and only using the solutions to check your work, it is likely the professor will be fine with it.</em></p>
<p>rule of thumb: if you have to question whether it's cheating or have doubts, then it most likely falls under cheating. like i said that's just a rule of thumb. in your situation, just ask the professor, get any doubt out of the way. better be safe than sorry right?</p>
<p>Thanks everyone for all the advice.
So, I read the syllabus again, and I notice under Strongly Recommended Text, my prof listed the name of the textbook, and added below that “It is unnecessary to purchase any study guides or other materials”. Well, his homework questions are from the Study Guide of that textbook which means it’s not like its unnecessary; he just doesn’t want us to find out where he got those questions. But then again, it’s possible that he doesn’t know that the site we are using to do the homework actually uses workbooks for that text.
Well, he did add in the syllabus that “Cheating or related acts of academic dishonesty will not be tolerated. Please do not test me on this issue”. This really scares me. I can’t go to his office hour because it’s after class (I have a class in that hour), so I may need to e-mail him and set an appointment. I am still thinking of what to write. Or maybe I should just wait till next meeting, but when? I can’t talk to him at the beginning of class because the auditorium is already filled by then, and he is kind of busy preparing for the lecture. At the end of the class, I need to hurry for my next class since I only have 10 minutes break. So, I need to e-mail him. This is stressing me out; I thought it was a blessing to find such information.
If only it was another subject, then I probably won’t be discussing this issue. Just this class is known to be a difficult one, especially the homework. So, acing all the homework will really raise an eyebrow. I mean it is doable to get around a B, but not straight As. He also mentions average and the max and min score of the homework during the beginning of class, so it would be weird to always be the outlier. It would also be embarrassing if he humiliate me in front of the class. I’ll think about it some more.</p>
<p>Use the answers, but make sure to get a few of them wrong in order to disguise yourself. You can progressively get fewer and fewer wrong though, make it seem like you're just grasping the material better.</p>
<p>You can learn a lesson from this though: on the first homework assignment from each class, do a laborious search online for the teacher's source (if it doesn't seem like the teacher just created the questions himself). That way, you can get A's from the beginning and it won't look suspicious -- you'll just be a really good student. That's what I do. I've gotten 100% on all of my online quizzes for a reason. ;)</p>
<p>I don't think it would be cheating as long as you completed the work yourself and didn't just copy down the answers. The solution manual is out there and available to students, so it's not like you would be doing anything illegal really. He also didn't say "Do NOT buy the workbook"; he just said that you didn't need it. If you are really worried about this, you could go to him and say "I noticed that there is a solution manual for the textbook. Do you think that getting it would help me do better on my assignments?" or something along those lines and see what he says.</p>
<p>I say it depends. Are you just going to copy down the answers from the site and reword them a little bit? Because that's cheating, and it really doesn't help you in the long run.</p>
<p>I think that referencing it, as in checking your answers and then correcting them is fine, but only after you've actually worked on the assignment and done it to the best of your ability. I don't think that's cheating at all. If it's helping you to better understand the material after you've tried your hardest, I don't see the problem. </p>
<p>Like everyone else said, I would talk to him to make sure. Just don't act like you were going to just copy the answers down for a perfect score, because that is cheating.</p>
<p>This does not sound like cheating to me, unless the professor specifically ordered you not to use supplements. The fact that it is homework tells me that the prof does not care about whether or not you use supplements or not, because if he did he would force you to do it in class under his control.</p>