What if a student is cheating because they know their family has sacrificed a lot to provide opportunity and they don’t want to disappoint them?
Does that still make them a “bad person” or “ethically bankrupt”?
Yup.
Most likely they’d be more disappointed if they find out their kid is a cheater.
Don’t know if I’d call them ethically bankrupt because everyone makes morally questionable decisions at one point in their life or other (and that’s not something so egregious that it’s beyond forgiveness). However, they would definitely be in the wrong for doing so because they are acting in bad faith.
I, for one, do think that institutions are in some ways responsible for the prevalence of dishonesty by not bothering to check up on even the most basic facts of an applicant. Take a look at the infamous Adam Wheeler, no one checked any of his fake transcripts? He was claiming to come from one of the top prep schools and had forged transcripts and rec letters from MIT, talk about a lack of due diligence! He survived by through blatant plagairism for his entire time at Harvard up until by chance an English prof noticed the cross over. How is that even possible? It goes to show you how little plagiarism is actually checked. Had he not applied for Rhodes scholarships and stayed content with lower level awards for his plagiarism he would have likely never been caught. A closer look at his FAFSA record would have revealed his previous attendance at Bowdoin. I’m not saying that colleges should do background checks but he claimed to have co authored 4 books. Google would have solved that in an instant. The blatant plagiarism went unchecked up until the Rhodes application
I also believe wholeheartedly that universities often turn a blind eye because it’s beneficial to them. They get not only the funds of full pay foreigners but also the ranking boost from admitting people who have submitted top GPA’s and test scores.
I think we can condemn a system that provides substantial incentives to cheat, as NeoDymium has in some of his posts, without condoning the cheating itself. But that’s just me.
Technology has improved significantly in the 10 years since Wheeler started to weave his tale of college lies, and began his academic career at Bowdoin.Big data and enrollment management tools are more sophisticated, and can hopefully be used more successfully to identify suspect applications and stamp a big red REJECT on their file.
@NotVerySmart while I see your point, I don’t really see the college admissions system as an isolated section of society. There will always be incentives to cheat in many different areas in life. But people have the moral responsible not to. If they choose to do it anyway, that’s their choice, but they shouldn’t blame a system for it when thousands of people operate under that same system and don’t cheat.
I think this is a good question. I was asking myself if I apply the same standard of honesty to everybody, including people who are trying to escape from poverty and oppression. I don’t think I do. Drawing lines is not so easy. Still, as I said before, little lies on your college application aren’t likely to help you, and big lies are likely to be uncovered. So really, don’t bother lying. It’s one less thing to worry about.
The main issue I have, is that as international student, he’s probably pushing out another student who actually worked for it. It’s likely to be a waste too, because he most likely won’t be able to handle any school that won’t take him. A lot of student’s who were good enough to get in, find they can’t handle that kind of rigor. His odds of graduating are probably small.
From his own perspective and a risk/reward standpoint, it’s not that bad. If he doesn’t forge documents, he doesn’t get in. If they catch him, he doesn’t get in. Basically, the worst case scenario ends the same way as inaction. This is basically the definition of “nothing to lose”.
The stuff about jail is pretty much impossible. The only way it would work is if the school fell for it initially, gave him grant money and then discovered the fraud on review. That doesn’t seem very likely, so he’ll most likely be fine either way.
Well the point is that there’s two separate issues there - one is the responsibility of individuals to act in good faith, and one is the responsibility of the universities to find and admit the best candidates, and by extension to create an environment that encourages good-faith high quality students to be the most likely to be taken. No one is disagreeing with you - we’re just talking about a separate, but related, issue.
What is that based on? Has there been a study of students who get admitted specifically on false representations and go on to either graduate or fail?
I would say that HS grades are probably a strong predictor of college grades, which would be good reason to think that if his HS grades are low, his college grades would be as well.
I think most applicants who get into top colleges by committing some sort of fraud can handle the schoolwork. I wish I could say otherwise, but I think on the balance this has to be the case. It’s well established that a lot of top schools have ~30,000 applicants for about 2,000 spots, and the majority of those applicants are capable of handling the work at such colleges.
As much as these colleges would love it if we took it for granted that they exist on some higher plane, and the 1,600 students in Harvard’s freshman class (to take one example) really are the 1,600 who can handle the college’s rigors, the evidence suggests otherwise. Adam Wheeler, for one, faked his transcript and didn’t flunk out of Harvard.
Here’s a former student writing about the ease of coasting along at Harvard.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2005/03/the-truth-about-harvard/303726/
Maybe things have changed in recent years, but having spoken to one recent graduate there’s a common assumption that nothing is wrong with half the grades given out at Harvard being As. Harvard students, the logic goes, are the best of the best, so why give a C- to a student who would easily earn a B+ at worst (and likely an A) at a “lesser” university. This accounts in part for graduation rates in the high 90s, and I’m inclined to believe that most students - whether they faked admissions credentials or not - will graduate unless illness or some side project prevents them from attending classes.
I use Harvard as an example here, but one can imagine a similar mindset prevailing at a number of elite institutions.
@jym626 Are you saying that since I am Asian I am a cheater? 
I have never falsified information nor have I cheated on a standardized test. None of my Asian friends have either (to my knowledge). Yes, Asians are put under a LOT of pressure to get good grades and all, but the majority of Asians, just like the majority of most races (I hope) don’t cheat. 
@Mandalorian: I find that sad, and wholeheartedly disagree.
@Waiting2exhale- I’m not forcing you to agree with me, FYI, just lending my personal opinion. I don’t know about you, but I’m not the moral police. I’m not the police-police either. Becoming a target of retribution and the stress that comes with it to me just doesn’t justify reporting something that will probably be caught anyway.
HSDana,
No need to be dramatic. That’s a rather huge leap. The known cheating rings are in, IIRC, China, Korea and India. ANd some in the US were sending info back there as well. If you are an honest student, then this does not pertain to you, and your nationality is irrelevant. But, if you know of cheating and do not report it, you are no better, in the eyes of many.
In truth, this is the kind of thing that lends itself well to arbitrary criteria. If 20,000 meet the merit criteria but only 1600 spots are available, what differentiates the rest? Primarily petty BS. And I see very little wrong with having so little respect for arbitrary criteria that you would lie.
You’d be taking a spot from someone else who better satisfied the arbitrary criteria but wouldn’t be any more capable of doing something special with their time at the school. That’s on the school for having arbitrary criteria.
I would think that doing what is necessary, where one can see that one’s information and action are necessary to bring about a change, seldom has one, on principle, concerned about retribution. This is a situation where it is not likely to occur, or happen, and may even act to re-set the moral compass of the student.
We each act from what we know, and our experiences inform our choices.
And surely this is just the kind of student they are looking for. [-X