Cheating in School Essay Example
Cheating in school, it's something that happens every day and causes more problems than solutions. In the article “academic integrity'' it says that Academic cheating is super common in high schools in the United States. Statistically, 64% of public high school students admit to serious test cheating. 58% say they have plagiarized. 95% of students admit to some form of cheating. This includes tests, copying homework, and papers. Some people cheat because it gives them more power, others because they want to stand out. And some because they are just lazy. Some may ask how this cheating can be stopped. The answer is by making it harder for kids to cheat, making grades less important and by making kids want to be involved in the subject.
Making it harder for kids to cheat would cause it so the kids are discouraged and less likely to do it. Some ways that you can make it more challenging for kids to cheat is by taking their phone. A study from “NEA” shows that ⅓ of high school students cheat by using their phones. Just from taking students' phones it could eliminate 33% of the students from cheating. Something else that could be done to make it harder for kids to cheat is by taking their study guides before the test or quiz. One of the most common ways kids cheat on a test is by using those study guides or practice tests during the test. Most teenagers will take the easy way out of things, so they don't have to take responsibility. If you can make it so the easy way out is taking the test without cheating the students are much more likely to not cheat.
Another reason kids cheat is because of all the pressure they have put on them by their parents and peers. “The Mental Health Toll of Academic Pressure” says that ⅔ of students feel pressured to get good grades. This pressure is causing students to cheat so that when they get a good grade they can be relieved. If we made it so the grading system focused on effort and participation the stress would be relieved and the cheating would decrease. Everyone is different and has different skills but if teachers just graded on how much effort kids put in kids stress would decrease and furthermore would decrease cheating.
Some people say that no matter what you do kids will find a new way to cheat and cheating won't decrease. This is a very understandable reason because we have seen it happen through years and years of school. However, they are wrong. There are only so many ways to cheat and if we take these few precautions academic cheating will decrease significantly. According to “The Mental Health Toll of Academic Pressure” 98% of students will take the easy way out of any hard situation they are in. Kids won't keep finding new ways to cheat if it is harder.
Lastly, if kids were more involved in school they wouldn’t have that desire to cheat. The most common classes kids cheat in are core classes. This is because these classes are typically harder classes and because they aren't as engaging. According to the “Academic Cheating Fact Sheet” Students who do not like their classes are 80% more likely to cheat. If we could get students to engage in class then cheating would decrease exponentially. Some ways to make students more engaged in class is by making it fun. Every class can be made fun, even math. If the teacher is willing to put in the work to make the games and find fun ways to teach students will be much more engaged and cheating will decrease.
