If this is the response you have to people telling you that cheating is a Very Bad Thing, I have to wonder why in the world you’re in college.
Seriously, as a college professor, the very least I do to students who I catch cheating is failing the assignment. That’s because I work at an open-admission institution, where the vast majority of our students are underprepared, and don’t always have the cultural capital to know what’s crossing the line. Fine—flunking an assignment rather than the entire course for a first offense gives them a chance to learn that lesson.
But if they’ve done it before? (And nearly every college keeps track.) F in the class. (And when I taught at a more selective institution, that was the penalty for a first offense.)
I have no sympathy. None at all. Those who cheat ruin the worth of their college’s degrees for those who show more integrity. Cheaters aren’t just harming themselves, they’re harming everybody.