The technology of cheating

As our society becomes more and more technologically advanced, many great applications improve our standard of living. The internet and the “anytime, anywhere” access provided by smart phones, put almost endless information at our fingertips. Unfortunately, many people will use technology to scam the system. Students are overwhelmingly honest, but some have found ingenious ways to use technology to cheat on exams and homework assignments. This paper looks at some of these techniques that have recently entered into the classroom. Some students consider it a challenge to cheat without being caught while others are simply too lazy or unwilling to commit to the study time necessary to do well. Online solution manuals are available for almost every text book. Accessing these with smart phones either in completing homework assignments or in extreme cases, during exams are becoming widespread. Even if the exam problem is not taken from a textbook, similar problems can be found and accessed. Text messaging answers back and forth with other test takers is also very widespread among dishonest students. Other methods such as using small scanners to scan tests have been reported in venues as controlled as the Professional Engineering Exam in Texas. Exam takers are no longer allowed to use their own pencil during this exam due to high tech cheating. Students in state nursing exams are not allowed to wear jackets during the exams due to rampant cheating. Very small micro-cameras and very tiny hearing aids allow a second party to view the exam, look the answer up in a reference book (or Google the answers) and then relay the answer to the test taker. Taking pictures of the test with a phone and sending it to the second party for either copying or helping the first student is also relatively easy. Storing information on graphics calculators can also be easily accomplished and retrieved during exams without the instructor realizing the student is cheating instead of using their calculator for legitimate uses. Students can also buy papers online wrote by others. These are very difficult for instructors to trace. Technology, however, can be used by the instructors with the advent of anti-plagiarism websites where written material can be uploaded for authenticity verification. The purpose of this paper is to bring to light some of the most prevalent high tech cheating techniques and possible ways to combat them to ensure integrity within the classroom. Engineering is a subject that has extreme consequences for failure. If a student cheats their way through their engineering degree and finds themselves in a position designing airplane parts, bridges, or in similar critical areas, people's lives are in danger. Integrity in the classroom matters. No matter how vigilant the instructors are at combating dishonesty, attitudes about what constitutes cheating have changed. This paper will also present the results of a preliminary survey given to freshman engineering students at the University of Pittsburgh in Johnstown on what constitutes cheating.