What happens to a student who won't take shortcuts?

Colleges & Universities Cornell University
1

<p>I know that students today have access to teacher’s manuals, test files, internet, other students, etc. What happens to the student who won’t take “short cuts”? I’m speaking specifically of engineering. With all those labs, problem sets, tests…what if a student won’t take advantage of any form of assistance because of his desire to not “cheat”? I’m wondering if the level of work has been raised by students using these sources for help and that leaves students who refuse it at a significant disadvantage.</p>

<p>Does Cornell combat this by having a lot of group work? They have to be aware of everything out there and I hope they don’t “punish” students by making the material so hard every year that the usual resources just won’t help them. My kid will fail if this is the case, because right now, he is determined to do everything the “right way”.</p>

<p>By the way, this comment isn’t just for Cornell, but all universities. I think it’s a national issue.</p>

2

<p>Everything I’m about to say is old and may be wrong, but here’s my dated perspective:</p>

<p>I did not recall witnessing, or even hearing about, any cheating whatsoever in engineering courses at Cornell.</p>

<p>The bulk of your grade in most engineering-type courses is usually 2-4 prelims and a final. There is, essentially, no way to cheat this, it is mano a mano, you against the exam. There may be a couple intro courses where profs are sometimes accused, rightly or wrongly, of recycling exam questions, but engineering courses are not among them.There are billions of questions they can pull out, your little test file bank won’t help at all. Except perhaps as a source of practice problems.</p>

<p>You could copy homework assignments from other people, but that’s really pretty stupid, since the homeworks provide you the opportunity to learn and practice the material, which you need to do per prior paragraph.</p>

<p>Labs usually are done with a group of other people, and there is data. You can’t just hand in someone else’s lab report, if they didn’t come up with the very same data that the rest of your small group did. Unless your whole small group decides to cheat in unison this may be detected.</p>

<p>At the end of the day, you will be out there, and your boss will ask you to do something. And you will have to do it yourself, without ability to cheat. You will be better served for life by getting in the habit of producing your own excellent work, yourself.</p>

<p>Personally I think its ok to discuss homeworks, and lab results, with other students, so long as the final product you hand in is your own. Helping each other learn collaboratively is an asset to the ultimate task, which is to [invidually]master the material and ace the exams. We used to study together to prepare for the prelims.</p>

<p>So my answer is, that student will be better off in the long run. But also, the vast majority of engineering students there fall into this category. Actually I knew none that didn’t.</p>

<p>I heard of a situation at a different school (NOT engineering, NOT Cornell), where someone copied a paper from a workgroup member who had taken the same course the year before, from a different prof, and got an “A” on it. This time around, the new prof thought it was trash and gave him a very poor grade. Turns out the prior prof. just liked that other group member, he had done a lot of work for him. The guy would have been better off, even in the short term, just doing his own work without “shortcuts”. Also, I personally know two people of my generation who were kicked out of their schools (NOT Cornell) for plagiarizing.</p>

3

<p>Your post makes me happy! I just worry about professors taking the material to a high level because of kids taking advantage of sources they shouldn’t be using. I have a friend whose son did engineering at another strong university and he said he couldn’t have gotten through without using sources/people/test files, etc. He said “everyone did it” - I know that there is rarely the case that everyone is doing anything, but it does speak to the culture. That boy told his mom he ordered the teacher’s manual online for several of his classes. My son going to Cornell engineering isn’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but this is important to him. I really think his essay on personal integrity is one of the reasons he was admitted. I know he would settle for B’s and C’s, but failing would be tough for him.</p>

4

<p>Again: ordering the teacher’s manual will help with some of the assigned homeworks, you’ll have the answers to all the questions. But to do well in the class you have to do problems in the exam room, by yourself, without the teacher’s manual. Homework sets are usually only a small portion of your grade. I actually don’t think it’s a bad thing to have the teacher’s manual. If it helps you learn and master the material. But to be sure you are mastering the material, which you have to do for the exams, you need to do the homework problems yourself, not merely copy them. Because when you get in the test room you cannot copy them, you have to be able to do them.</p>

<p>Based on my experiences I can’t see how any “test files” would be any use whatsoever, other than as additional practice. There are so many problems they can, and do, put on tests, there is no need to put the identical problem on exams over and over, for these courses. And I don’t think they do that in practice.</p>

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<p>This post makes me happy too :smiley: Thank you!</p>

<p>I don’t see how having the teacher’s manual is considered cheating, though. For at least my calc class, I don’t have the teacher’s manual per se, but everyone was issued this answer book where it works out the whole problem…for Only the odd ones. It shows all the claculations and all the steps in the problem. It’s sooo helpful and when I do the homework, I do the problem, check the answer… and then see the method the answer book uses…last…after I tried it on my own. </p>

<p>It’s really nifty because I can see possibly another method to solve the problem, or it can teach me new math tricks to add to my bag of tricks. And if I’m really stuck, then I just take a peak. I mean, it’s better than being stuck and not doing the problem. I kind of think of it like It lets me see through the eyes of the teacher which will bring me closer to the understanding of what’s truly going on. I highly attribute to learning from this answer book (that clearly gives me the potential to cheat and just copy the answers since the teacher usually just assigns the odd problems) to getting a 5 on the AP exam because I use it to my advantage the right way.</p>

<p>But I see your point that people who may chose to not take advantage of some things might be at a disadvantage - like using the teacher’s manual. But I look it as taking advantage of those things in a non-cheating way…kind of give it a new twist. y’know what I mean? Taking advantage of the teacher’s manual and old tests - not to cheat- but to use it the right way so that I learn from it and puts me in a better position to be a better student, learner, and future employee (or even employer)</p>

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<p>well truth is only thing that matters is where you end up (your job). do whatever you want to get there.</p>

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<p>No, that’s not the end at all. You have to get someplace, then you have to be good enough to stay there, through all the cuts, and hopefully you also turn out to be good enough to advance from that point. Whatever capabilities you’ve developed will help with the latter steps, for which there will not be a teacher’s manual.</p>

8

<p>yea, but a teacher’s manual will give you the tools from which to learn. And then you can support yourself.</p>