Cheating More than Doubles at Ohio State
Cheating More than Doubles at Ohio State
Plus, Quick Bites. Plus, the Better Business Bureau warns of homework tutor extortion scams.
Issue 19
Ohio State Dealing with 1,454 Cases of Academic Misconduct in Just Seven Months
According to reporting in Ohio State’s student newspaper - and not, it seems, in the regional daily newspaper - in the last seven months of 2020 cases of alleged cheating at Ohio State University have more than doubled compared to the entire previous year.
The Committee on Academic Misconduct had 1,454 cases filed in the last seven months of 2020 - more than double the 721 academic misconduct cases filed and resolved in all of 2019.
The spike in cases has caused delays in hearings and dispositions, the reporting says. The Chair of the Committee on Academic Misconduct also says,
online tools such as Chegg and Course Hero are easily accessible to students when taking exams or completing assignments.
Ohio State is a large school; enrollment is north of 66,000. Still, given that a staggeringly small percentage of cheating is ever caught or reported, 1,454 cases in seven months is stunning. Skipping weekends, that’s more than ten reports of cheating every single day.
Good for Ohio State for sharing their numbers and discussing the challenges of maintaining integrity.
The Cheat Sheet Quick Bites
The Palm Beach County (FL) Classroom Teachers Association released a survey of educators showing that “74.6% of teachers said they've seen increased levels of cheating on classwork, homework, tests, and quizzes during simultaneous teaching.”
Heather Morris, director of student advocacy and case management at University of Manitoba says, “There has been an increase in academic misconduct during online tests and exams that weren’t as common when exams were written in person.”
Teachers Union of Ireland (college-level) president Martin Marjoram said that, “Protecting the integrity of assessment and protecting against plagiarism in an era of remote learning have also become more time-consuming and more challenging.”
Citing “widespread collusion and cheating” at other universities teaching online, administrators at Trinity College at University of Oxford (England) have decided to move about 30 exams in chemistry and classics back to in-person, on campus tests.
A review and summary of research affiliated with Canada’s Centre for Governance at the University of Ottawa, found that “the open-book format and the lack of student monitoring paved the way for more cheating than usual.” And that this, along with related factors, “will likely have a temporary impact on the value of degrees.”
Better Business Bureau: “Scam Alert: Cheating on Homework Leads to Extortion Scam”
The Better Business Bureau (BBB) has issued a public “Scam Alert” for homework and test “tutors.”
According to BBB, the tutors do school work, take tests or write assignments then ask for more money. If you don’t pay,
They send threatening emails or text messages claiming they will contact your school and expose you as a cheater.
This scam isn’t new. It’s been academic legend for years. Nonetheless, having BBB say it “has gotten reports” of the scam is new. And, they want to remind everyone,
Hiring someone to complete your school assignments is cheating.
Yes, it is. The possibility of being extorted or turned in by a “tutor” is just one more reason not to do it.
In the next “The Cheat Sheet” - cheating at University of West Virginia and a call for proposals on Academic Integrity in Europe. Plus, another mass cheating event with Chegg. Plus, that research and solution I’ve been promising to get to all week. Sign up and share “The Cheat Sheet” below.