Long Island SAT Cheating Ring - Great Neck

Parents Forum
101

<p>“Teens do stupid things, and their impulsive behavior is biological.”</p>

<p>Latest research indicates the opposite - the more mature the gray matter, the more likely to engage in impulsive behavior. <a href=“Risk-Taking Teens Have More Mature Brains - Scientific American”>Risk-Taking Teens Have More Mature Brains - Scientific American; What is true, however, is that teens do not have as much knowledge/experience of consequences.</p>

<p>(What’s really scary is 45-65 year old men.)</p>

<p>Meanwhile, the school district (for all I know, led by 45-65 year old men) hasn’t said there would be ANY consequences for the miscreants.</p>

102

<p>Mini,
I will just quote what one of the commenters on the article said: </p>

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103

<p>It just shows… Tons of kids probably do this but it takes one guy to get caught…</p>

104

<p>Mickys,
The name of the person taking the SAT for others has been released since he is not a minor.</p>

<p>I agree with gstransfer. I think this is probably more common than most of us think.</p>

105

<p>“A number of years ago while coaching my sons in LL, one received in-school suspension for a day for a prank.
I suspended his playing in a play-off game for this misdeed to affirm there are penalties for everything, despite his being one of our top players and the importance of the game.
I was chastised by a board member for this suspension and I told him my chief concern was raising a good, honest kid, not a ball player.
Couple years later another player laughed at a crying opponent after hitting him with a pitch and calling the opposing coach filthy names during a game…the board took no action for this conduct because they wanted the kid for their travel team.
WTH are we teaching our kids???”</p>

<p>And a number of years ago (before 9/11) a bunch of kids at Scarsdale Middle School called in a bomb scare to the Yoohoo plant. They were caught but being underage weren’t arressted. The parents “just” had to pay a $15K fine. That weekend a bunch of the kids went to the Yankee game. DH was there with my ex-bil and his kids who were taken along with the “pranksters.” We were stunned as not only would no kid of mine be at a Yankee game if they did that - no kid of mine would have seen the light of day for a very, very long time.</p>

106

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<p>That’s what I think – I wonder if the test-taker was caught by taking too many high-scoring tests in the same area and thus raising a statistical red flag. When 1.5 million kids take a test every year, I’d imagine that at least a couple thousand pay for replacement test takers. For $500, one could probably find a regular test-site proctor willing to look the other way.</p>

107

<p>^^^ I agree he should have charged one kid 10-15K, with the reasoning of “one and done”</p>

108

<p>Regarding photo IDs, what percentage of high school students lack the usual well recognized photo IDs (driver’s license, state ID, passport)?</p>

<p>And how recognizable are the high school photo IDs to people not associated with that high school?</p>

109

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<p>A high school ID was sufficient for my son to take his ACT and SAT IIs off-site from his high school.</p>

<p>With Photoshop, a scanner, and access to a lamination machine, how hard can it be nowadays to find a geeky classmate to make you a fake ID?</p>

110

<p>Do they compare the test scores to the GPA for every student? </p>

<p>College Board could just microchip the kids when they are toddlers. They could offer some add ons such as GPS tracking, behavior control mechanisms or streaming Pandora in the chip.</p>

111

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<p>Highly unlikely – plus there are lots of unmotivated smart kids who have low GPAs and yet get high SAT/ACT scores.</p>

<p>According to the NYT article, the school faculty started hearing rumors that someone was taking tests for other students, so they looked over their records of high-scoring SAT takers whose results seemed suspect. So “one and done” would have been a smarter decision for the actual hired test-taker.</p>

<p>A fairly easy red-flag for College Board might be a student who got a 150 on the PSAT and then a 2300 on the SAT itself. The ACT also has 9th and 10th grade pre-tests that could be looked over when the test results seem too good to be true.</p>

112

<p>I agree with LoremIpsum…someone raised a red flag that made them pull records. Teens have a hard time not talking. Just look at the number of posts on CC about cheating and that would give you an idea.</p>

113

<p>OK, so how wide spread is cheating? And how do kids feel about it? Check out this thread that just started on CC:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/high-school-life/1216684-letting-your-friends-copy-your-homework.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/high-school-life/1216684-letting-your-friends-copy-your-homework.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

114

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<p>Yes, but the question was really whether someone not at the high school would be able to recognize the high school photo ID as fake. If each high school’s photo ID looks different, then someone looking at it may not be able to recognize a mediocre-quality fake the way they may recognize as fake a mediocre-quality fake driver’s license, state ID, or passport.</p>

115

<p>My son takes after me and despises having his picture taken. He had managed to hide on picture day every year since 5th grade. When he went to take his PSAT in grade 10, the dean pulled him aside and told him that he wasn’t going to be allowed in because his school ID showed a 10 year old kid and he was not anymore. They let him in because it was our home school and they knew him, but he did go for an updated ID card in case he had to take a future test elsewhere.</p>

<p>My son is another one of those low GPA, decent SAT, 5 on APs kind of kids although I don’t think any of his teachers would think he’s a cheater (he’s not, he won’t even take a prep course or do a practice test because he considers that cheating!).</p>

<p>As a final note, I know someone who was suspended from college for a year for making phony IDs. He is now a lawyer and he came from Great Neck.</p>

116

<p>There seems to be a lot of talk about fake id’s. ETS could get around that by adopting the policies of some other standardized tests. Both the MCAT and USMLE require government ID, photo and a fingerprint every time you enter or leave the testing room. The prometric centers obviously have the capability to handle that, and it would virtually eliminate the possiblity of this happening.</p>

117

<p>Someone commented on the test-taker taking a Saturday and Sunday administration. Great Neck has a large population of Orthodox Jews and many of those kids legitimately test on Sunday for religious reasons. It would not be hard to take a test on both days in that area.</p>

118

<p>“OK, so how wide spread is cheating? And how do kids feel about it? Check out this thread that just started on CC.”</p>

<p>Oy. There is one who describes it as “networking.” </p>

<p>In the good old days we only used fake ID’s for getting into bars.</p>

119

<p>Oh and another thing is that once the authorities were alerted to the situation and they pulled all of the tests and compared them, the handwriting on the essays was the same and matched the boy who was arrested.</p>

120

<p>That is what I thought, emilybee. She was the one that talked about banking favors and offering your homework to everyone you could so everyone owed you favors.</p>