Getting away with cheating

By The Daily Progress

Published: July 18, 2008

A kid cheats on an exam. Should there be any consequences?

Most of us would say yes.

At least, the exam score should be dropped. In high school or college, that would damage the overall grade in the class — perhaps drop it to failing.

But what if the student simply were allowed to take the exam over again, with no consequences?

Most of us would cry foul.

But the two companies that run college-entrance testing follow exactly that policy.

Students taking the SATs or ACTs who are discovered to be cheating will have their scores invalidated. But their high schools and the colleges to which they are applying will not be told why the invalidation occurred — for all the schools know, the reason could be a computer glitch in scoring the tests.

Students will likely just take the tests over again and submit their scores, with no one the wiser.

It’s one more way in which students are being taught that ethics don’t matter. Winning is what matters.

Michael Josephson of the Los Angeles-based Josephson Institute of Ethics put it this way: “… Why not say to someone who robbed a 7-Eleven, ‘Please give back the merchandise or pay for it, but we don’t want you to feel bad about stealing’.”

The testing companies say they do care about ethics. They say they are acting under ethical precepts. The ethical consideration to which they give highest value is that of privacy.

But they also reveal a desire not to get involved.

“What we’re trying to do is make sure the scores that we send to colleges are valid,” Ed Colby of ACT told the Los Angeles Times (“Cheating ... has few consequences,” July 14). “It’s not our intention to go around punishing students who make mistakes. ...”

Said the SAT’s Tom Ewing, “[T]o prohibit somebody from taking the test [after a cheating incident] that might hinder their educational future seems a bit extreme.”

“A bit extreme.” Well, yes. That’s the point.

Imposed consequences for cheating may have to be extreme in order to get the message across that this is not acceptable behavior. At the University of Virginia, the penalty for cheating is supposed to be expulsion from school.

Some say the testing organizations are afraid of being sued if they reveal cheaters’ names — even if only “confidentially” to high schools or prospective colleges. The SAT, for one, says fear of being sued is not at issue.

But the testing organizations should enforce moral accountability for those who are taking their tests — just as we hope they would do with their own staff. An employee found to have willfully altered test scores wouldn’t be let off with no consequences, would he?

If the testing companies don’t want breach confidentiality by informing schools when people cheat, then let them try this:

Invalidate the first scores of students who cheat, and allow them to take the test again. But make it a policy, clearly understood from the first test onward, that cheaters who take the test over will have their second scores automatically dropped by, say, 20-25 percent.

That penalty might make students think twice about taking the risk.