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[FONT=Arial,Helvetica]Ohio State toughens punishments for cheaters[/FONT]
<!-- -->COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Ohio State University has toughened punishments for students caught cheating, handing out failing grades and suspensions for violators who used to commonly receive probation.
Faculty complained the penalties needed to be tougher as the number of cases increased.The university heard 539 cases of academic misconduct last school year, with 85 percent resulting in discipline, according to an annual report on campus cheating presented to the University Senate last week. There were 287 cases five years ago."If somebody is caught cheating, they ought to receive at the very least a failing grade on the course. This certainly represents an advance over the previous pattern," said professor Marilyn Blackwell, who teaches Scandinavian languages, literature, culture and film.Students who plagiarize, copy from classmates or break course rules now usually fail the course and are put on probation for at least one academic quarter, The Columbus Dispatch reported Tuesday in an analysis of the cheating report.The most common punishment used to be probation and a zero on the assignment.Six students were expelled last school year for cheating and 40 were suspended for at least one quarter.It's unclear why the number of academic misconduct cases has grown, but many professors now use computer software to catch cheaters. They also can type a suspicious phrase into an Internet search engine."There are a lot of students doing things on the Internet they don't consider cheating," said Don McCabe, founding president of the Center on Academic Integrity at Duke University and now a business professor at Rutgers University. "It allows them to take some shortcuts."Ohio State students caught cheating are most likely to be taking chemistry, computer science and engineering, or statistics courses, The Dispatch said. They're also more likely to be male and seniors.Faculty are trying to be clearer about how to cite other people's work and the rules for working in groups. One of the choices for mandatory freshman reading this year was "The Cheating Culture.""We want students to understand _ anytime you turn in an assignment, you have choices. If your choices are to cheat or to turn in nothing, the right choice is to turn in nothing," said Peter Pappas, coordinator of the university's Committee on Academic Misconduct.___
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[FONT=Arial,Helvetica]Ohio State toughens punishments for cheaters[/FONT]
<!-- -->COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Ohio State University has toughened punishments for students caught cheating, handing out failing grades and suspensions for violators who used to commonly receive probation.
Faculty complained the penalties needed to be tougher as the number of cases increased.The university heard 539 cases of academic misconduct last school year, with 85 percent resulting in discipline, according to an annual report on campus cheating presented to the University Senate last week. There were 287 cases five years ago."If somebody is caught cheating, they ought to receive at the very least a failing grade on the course. This certainly represents an advance over the previous pattern," said professor Marilyn Blackwell, who teaches Scandinavian languages, literature, culture and film.Students who plagiarize, copy from classmates or break course rules now usually fail the course and are put on probation for at least one academic quarter, The Columbus Dispatch reported Tuesday in an analysis of the cheating report.The most common punishment used to be probation and a zero on the assignment.Six students were expelled last school year for cheating and 40 were suspended for at least one quarter.It's unclear why the number of academic misconduct cases has grown, but many professors now use computer software to catch cheaters. They also can type a suspicious phrase into an Internet search engine."There are a lot of students doing things on the Internet they don't consider cheating," said Don McCabe, founding president of the Center on Academic Integrity at Duke University and now a business professor at Rutgers University. "It allows them to take some shortcuts."Ohio State students caught cheating are most likely to be taking chemistry, computer science and engineering, or statistics courses, The Dispatch said. They're also more likely to be male and seniors.Faculty are trying to be clearer about how to cite other people's work and the rules for working in groups. One of the choices for mandatory freshman reading this year was "The Cheating Culture.""We want students to understand _ anytime you turn in an assignment, you have choices. If your choices are to cheat or to turn in nothing, the right choice is to turn in nothing," said Peter Pappas, coordinator of the university's Committee on Academic Misconduct.___