Re: Education Philosophy-T o Cheat or Not to Cheat

[Rip Stauffer <ripstaur@vabch.com>]

Frank Voehl wrote: "Cynthia raises an excellent point which was recently
addressed in a US News And World Report article *The Cheating Game* (11/22/99,
pp. 55). According to a recent poll, 84% of college students believe that they
need to cheat to get ahead in the world today and 90% believe that cheaters never
pay the price. While crib sheets and copying answers is nothing new, what has
changed now is the scope of the problem--technology that opens up new avenues to
cheat and the students boldness and erosion of conscience at every level of
education."

The Navy, in the wake of Tailhook, changed its core values to "Honor, Courage and
Committment." Despite that change, and all the committment to trying to ingrain
it, many of the students I taught would constantly try to "beat" every system I
put in front of them. They would steal red beads from the bowl during lunch,
record the wrong numbers, try to manipulate other systems in other games, all in
an attempt to "win." When confronted, the standard answer was, "Hey, if you ain't
cheatin', you ain't tryin', right?"

I only tell this story to expand the point a bit. Most of the leaders I taught
were otherwise very honorable people. They just didn't see anything wrong in this
case. They were conditioned by years of competition in education and every other
aspect of their lives. Even though they were not being graded, even though we
told them at the beginning of every exercise that they were not in competition,
they took every challenge as an opportunity to win, instead of an opportunity to
learn. We used THAT as a learning point in our debriefs. Some got it, some
didn't.

I also share Frank's pain with parents who do work for their kids. I don't mind
helping my kids with their homework, but I don't help them do it, I help them
learn what they need to know to do it themselves. The parents who do it for their
children in order to "make them more competitive" are failing in that objective,
but they don't know that. They are just doing their best. How would they know?

Rip Stauffer
Process Management International
rstauffer@nhbpr.com
612-344-1027
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