Monday, February 04, 2008

What do you think?

My friend recently came upon a dilemma that I thought was perfect for our blog because I wanted to hear what all of you thought. He is a tutor for a couple of classes, like one of those that posts on OneStart, facebook, etc. He had been in contact with this one individual that was willing to pay him almost 3 times the original rate! But of course he wanted more than just tutoring. For the extra pay, my friend was going to have to do everything but sit in on the tests. He was going to have to complete all the homework, papers, cheat sheets for the tests, and the day of the test explain how to do the basic stuff so the kid could do enough to pass the tests. He also told my friend that no one could know about the "help" and he would have to keep in confidential. Oh and to make things interesting lets say that the student is a scholarship athlete. What actions do you take? Blow the whistle? Take the job? Do nothing?

2 Comments:

Blogger Lilly said...

This just sounds like straight up cheating to me. Even though the tutor wouldn't sit in on the tests, he'd still be completing all of his other work for the student. Thus, it would not be the work of the student, who would be gaining all the credit. Furthermore, the fact that the student asked the tutor to keep it confidential just means that he knows what he is doing is wrong and doesn't want to get caught.

As unfortunate as it may be, I can imagine a lot of other students who would engage in similar behavior. This doesn't make it right, but would I blow the whistle? To be honest, I don't think I would. This kind of thing happens all the time, and I'm not sure that whistleblowing in this case would make a difference. Perhaps if it were a case of a group individuals engaging in fraudulent behavior, then I might take some action. Which brings up an interesting story…

A few months back in December of last year, Florida State coach Bobby Bowden (who is identified as the second all-time most winning coach) blew the whistle on his own football team. The school's investigation found that a tutor gave students answers while they were taking tests and typed papers for students. In total, he exposed 25 of his own athletes involved in an academic cheating scandal. On his own will, Bowden suspended these players until the end of the season. These allegations came right before their big Bowl Game against Kentucky and ultimately caused them to lose a big game.

I applaud Bowden’s courage and sense of ethics to suspend some of his best players in one of their most important games. I think what he did is especially important in setting a precedent for the many other sports teams out there who participate in unethical academic practices every day.

Going back to wtravis’ story, if I were in the tutor’s situation I would simply refuse to help, even for the increased pay. This is a very ethical decision to ultimately make, as many of us as college students are living month to month and eating Ramen three nights of the week. However, as the tutor, I don’t think I’d whistleblow because, quite frankly, I’m not sure it would do much good.

1:34 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I believe that the tutor should not take the job whether it is more money or not. I agree with Lilly that completing all of the work of the student would definitely be cheating and would then violate IU's academic misconduct policy. If the tutor were caught in the act of cheating, he would lose a lot more than just some extra money. The penalties for cheating can be suspension or expulsion from the university. If the tutor takes the job, he is putting his future on the line. A little extra cash or my future??? My future would win out every time. I do disagree with Lilly when she said that she would not blow the whistle. Even though it would be difficult, I would try to do something. I personally am so tired of athletes on this campus walking around like they are gods and thinking they can do whatever they want. I had a class with some of the basketball players and I think they showed up once and slept through the whole class. It's not fair to those of us that work hard to get good grades for others to have them handed to them because they play a sport.

You can definitely relate this case to whistle-blowing. The question one can ask is remaining silent good enough?? In the case of Enron, it wasn’t. Those that knew but stayed silent were looked at disappointingly for not taking the initiative to stop the top executives from their unethical act. If I knew the tutor’s situation and knew he did nothing to stop the athlete from cheating, I would look at him the same way.

1:57 PM  

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