cheating a waste of your money
Anytime I catch someone cheating the first time I ask why?
We then have a chat about the information that I am teaching is very important for them to be successful.
I then bring in person they cheated off of and make them aware they will be in just as much trouble the if there is a "next time".
This is not expected.
This has worked for me over the years.
On the serious side, although there is a definite message in the above statement, I am both a student and a professor – schizophrenia is double the fun.
If a professor ever accuses me of cheating, he/she/it had better have some very concrete evidence or the school and him/her/it could be facing a defamation lawsuit. My point is – be very careful before accusing a student of cheating; one had better have witnesses and/or definite indications on the student’s papers.
If students appear to be cheating during an exam, I would go to the front of the classroom and make an announcement about the perils of cheating/copying off another student’s paper/etc; I would look at every student in the classroom; I would then tell them to continue with the test.
If I believe, or have proof of student cheating, I too would out of view of other students approach the students in question and discuss the ramifications of their actions, especially if such actions continue.
I tell the student that if he/she continues this type of activity, he/she could become the next CEO of Enron :)
