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I read this article in the Washington Post Education section, “Why schools should relax about cheating”.  There is a lot about academic cheating in the news today—from kids paying others to take their SATs to administrators changing students’ answers on high stakes exams. Intrigued by the headline I decided to find out exactly what the author was trying to convey. Frankly, it was the kind of rationalization I would expect from an elementary school student.

The author wrote this in her blog, which the Post reprinted. She lives on a farm and homeschools her children. She begins by saying that looking at someone else’s paper to get the right answer is akin to “networking” in the work world. She says that kids in this generation are “great collaborators”. Then she talks about “leveraging technology” which again amounted to finding the answer that someone else has already figured out.

The author of that blog has confused the object of education—it is not to make you a better collaborator in the workforce. The object of getting an education is so that you learn a body of information as well as learn how to think and write critically. A test or a report is a way for the student to demonstrate what he has learned. It is not an opportunity to show what someone else has learned. Also, this would hardly work in the office. When given a task, you are expected to do it. What does this person do if there is no one to cheat off? And, passing someone else’s work off as your own has consequences in the work world as well.

She tells the story of her son taking a test on music theory.  This is how things went, “during the test, my son started looking at all the kids’ papers around him. The other kids were horrified, but they didn’t say anything.  I just sat and watched. It was so interesting to me that my son has a natural inclination to get the answers from the people around him when he didn’t know.  I let him do it.”

She goes on to say, “It’s unclear what he knows by himself about music theory” What he knows by himself? Is there another way to know something?

I guess her home school curriculum doesn’t include ethics or an explanation of plagiarism. If these kids get to college they will be in for a rude awakening.

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I am republishing my blog post of May 17, 2011 as the same advice still rings true:

For high school seniors, it is all but over. According to the calendar, classes may be going on for another six weeks or more, but many seniors have mentally left the building.

Senior Slide, Senioritis– however you name it, it is not a good idea.  Seniors may think that because they have sent in their deposits and AP tests are over that they can blow off the rest of the year. Think again.

Re-read your college admission letter and it will have wording similar to this: contingent upon successful completion of your academic year. By successful completion, the colleges mean that they want to see the same level of grades you have maintained for this year. If there is a significant drop in grades, colleges can rescind their offer of admission.

Merit scholarships can be affected as well–I had a family tell me that their student’s merit money –offered with the admission letter–was reduced when his second semester grades went down.

Admission offers can also be rescinded if the student experiences disciplinary issues–especially ones involving academic dishonesty.

Having an admissions offer rescinded doesn’t happen often, but it does happen. So, seniors, keep up the good work until the end of the school year. Keep your grades close to where they have been all year and don’t get into trouble. It’s not over yet.

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I was shocked last year when I read that Claremont McKenna had inflated their SAT scores for US News and World Report’s Rankings.  I was surprised when I read about George Washington University reporting false data. I was really disheartened when I read about Bucknell and now that I read that Tulane also tweaked its numbers regarding their Business School, I am just plain fed up.

My very first blog post for Next Stop: College– Sept. 12, 2010– was about college rankings, most notably US News and World Report, and how they are not at all useful in helping students and families decide which colleges are a good fit. I said that parents shouldn’t put much stock in the rankings, “don’t let the actual rank sway you unless you know what methodology they use. US News gives the lion’s share, almost 23%, of its weight to “undergraduate academic reputation” which amounts to administrators at colleges judging their peers. This is no way to assess the fit between your child and a college. That is better done on an individual basis using criteria important to your student.”

US News uses a lot of information that can be quantified and the colleges know that too. Apparently, some have found the temptation to tweak their numbers too great to resist. Too much emphasis on “enrollment management” versus building a community? Maybe. Too much pressure from many factions to get the rankings higher? No doubt.

We have got to get over the idea that everything can and should be ranked.  I have lost count of the number of magazines that will rank this or that aspect of a college or a major, some with unhelpful titles such as “13 Most Useless College Majors”. Again, I disagree with the methodology used for that ranking and therefore its conclusions.

We need to declare an end to this arms race for rankings. We are sending students a terrible message. I am not the first person to say this, but it bears repeating, “College is a match to made, not a contest to be won”.