It’s that time of year again. The fun and games of syllabus week are over and the stress of tests are upon us.
With the anxiety of tests, projects and other assignments, the temptation to be dishonest with your work can creep in.
In this age of digital technology, cheating has become a lot easier. In an article by the Cleveland Plain Dealer, more than eight out of 10 college students said they have cheated at least once in their college careers. Of the 300 students who were studied, 86 percent claimed they cheated in school and 54 percent indicated that cheating was OK. Some students admitted during the study that they needed to cheat in order to remain competitive among their peers. Seventy-two percent indicated they had used their phone, tablet or computer to cheat in class.
At Baylor, we have a culture of competition with students balancing classes, organizations and jobs to stay on top of the curve. With all of our commitments that we have outside the classroom, we can often are tempted to let these commitments take precedence over academics.
When we become too busy and overexerted, the temptation to cheat becomes even stronger because we may not have prepared for our tests or assignments like we should have. But despite your extracurricular involvement, no grade is worth the punishment that comes with academic dishonesty.
The Baylor University Honor Code makes it very clear there is no tolerance for academic dishonesty. Baylor has remained committed to seeing that all students recieve an equal opportunity to be successful. When you cheat, you are saying that you did not put forth the same effort to master the material as your classmates that completed their work honestly.
Plagiarism tops the list of most common offenses. According to the Baylor Academic Honesty website, a good way to avoid plagiarism is to clarify with your teacher how to cite your information and be certain that you have cited all of the sources you got your information from. Remember that your teachers are smarter than you think and they can tell when you are not honest with your work.
In this digital age, all the information you could ever want is at your fingertips. It is imperative that we remember cheating is never the answer to a problem, or the easy way out. You have worked too hard to get to where you are to throw it all away now for one grade.
