Why Students Cheat?
Imagine you are a students, an important exam or assignment deadline is looming near and you have not studies for it. You were too busy playing games on your computer, watching TV or socializing on Facebook. You know that you have to pass the exam but you cannot deny the inevitable fact that with your current preparation, you will not be able to do so. The easiest way out of this scenario (for a normal student) is to reset cheating or other false means__ why do all the work when you can take advantage of the people who do? Yet that is sad, isn’t the fact that cheating takes place, what is sad is that cheating is widely accepted and practices.
So what leads a student to act in such a way? The sad truth is that cheating no longer carries the stigma it once did. Students believe that cheating is more prevalent and accepted today. They see it in every facet of life politics, business, home, and school. This issue was brought to light in the recent matriculation exams where the candidates were seen copying answers from resources that were smuggled in, which they then shared with each other. Some of them even had the courage to leave their seats to go and directly ask their fellows for assistance. These circumstances paint a grim picture of today’s youth, and it makes many wonder whether the students who are willing to cheat are willing to commit other unethical deeds to get ahead in life. The precedent being set is dangerous. Yet one cannot truly blame the students. The students are raised to think that cheating is right. It is our job to tell our kids the difference between right and wrong, and when we don’t, we fail in this fundamental duty.
Parents High Expectations
The first reason for its existence is that there are many students with families who have high expectations about their grade achievements and future career. Therefore, some students cheat __ when feeling the parental and peer pressure _ in order to get competitive, profitable credentials to impress their family or friends. When under pressure, the students are more likely to resort to measures like cheating to accomplish the high prospects set on them by their families.
While there is pragmatic evidence that parent factors have a positive association with, or facilitate, children’s achievement, there has also been great concern that parents’ unrealistic expectations create pressure and lower self confidence in their children. This cultural pressure is endemic, forcing students to be suicidal. Children are considered to be like showpieces these days. They are required to work like machines in order to make parents feel proud. You will see schoolchildren perturbing excessively and spending sleepless nights, loss of appetite and bouts of depression, all of which lead to suicidal tendencies. Relieving students from such high expectations would help in elevating their performance and will also result in a decrease in cheating cases. The focus must not be on being the best in class, but realizing one’s own true potential and doing one’s best. What is even more shocking nowadays is that parents actually facilitate their children in terms of cheating. How can a sixteen year old have enough money to bribe an examiner or buy exam papers before the examination? It has to come from the parents. Parents need to understand that exam results are not everything!
Another reason why students feel compelled to cheat is the overall system of education. Students are conditioned to value outcomes rather than the process of learning. This system continues to place more and more emphasis on getting the grade by any means possible. The benefits of individual learning are no longer seen as a goal or focus. Regularizing our educational system and introducing some well-thought changes can revolutionize this scenario. The educational curriculum should focus more on the learning of subject matter rather than the usual cramming and rote memory system. Equal chances should be given to all the students, irrespective of their caste, religion and region to appear for exams. The quality of education should be same for a student in a remote area and a student living in cities like Lahore, Karachi or Islamabad. This fair educational system will ensure that the students have access to quality education and hence they won’t feel the need to cheat in order to move forward in life.
A better system of creation, distribution and marking of papers is also essential. Conduction of regular assessments throughout the year to monitor the progress of students can also help release the peer pressure faced by the students on the final exam day. Furthermore, a computerized system of marking MCQs in papers should be introduced. This is being used by some of the universities for their entrance exams and has proved to be a successful way to eliminate disparity and injustice. To discourage cheating, variant papers can be used so that the adjacent students have dissimilar arrangement of questions. Strict measures should be taken for the ones who are cheating and those who are supporting it. Firm rules for the students and invigilators should be introduced which emphasize on severe penalty in case of cheating or any assistance in cheating. Random CCTV monitoring can also be done at randomly selected exam centers.
Cheating is a crime. Those steps are essential to either fully exterminate or at least minimize this practice to an insignificant quantity. If cheating in exams is not cut off at the root and allowed to be continued, it will set a dangerous precedent in the hearts and minds of our nest generation that crime does pay and there is nothing wrong in adopting unfair means to get ahead in life. A precedent that will only help to destroy our next generation.