125 Harvard Students being investigated for cheating on course, Government 1310: Introduction to Congress

Becoming a Congressman, someone must be a person who is brainy, needless to say, NY Republican Representative Christopher Lee (or Chris Lee) is one of  them.

I see no problem here. The cheating little bastards will be perfect for Congress, Hopefully a large percentage will have a wide stance, are very diverse and related to the  same elite skunks who routinely impress enough dopey American voters to be elected time and time again. 


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125 Harvard students investigated for cheating

Around 125 students at Harvard University are under investigation for cheating, in the largest ever misconduct scandal known at the school.

9:03AM BST 31 Aug 2012

The focus of the probe is a take-home final exam on which some students in a government class may have collaborated or copied answers, officials at Harvard, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, said.

Students familiar with the investigation said the course being investigated was Government 1310: Introduction to Congress, according to Harvard's newspaper, the Crimson.

Harvard teachers spent months combing through the exams to identify the students who are now under investigation by the college's Administrative Board, said Jay Harris, dean of undergraduate education. Students who violated university rules face a variety of sanctions, including being required to withdraw from school for a year, Harvard said in a statement.

"These allegations, if proven, represent totally unacceptable behaviour that betrays the trust upon which intellectual inquiry at Harvard depends," 

Harvard President Drew Faust said in a statement on the college's website.

The Administrative Board's actions are confidential, and Harvard will not reveal the identity of the students or the name of the course, Mr Harris said. He declined to predict how long the probe might take. 

Harvard is using the incident, which he called “unprecedented in living memory,” to increase student awareness of the importance of academic integrity, he said.

Mr Harris said school officials believe that electronic communication was part of the apparent rule violations.

“Technology has shifted the way people think about intellectual property, the way people think about communicating with each other,"”Mr Harris said.

All the students suspected of being involved in the cheating have been informed that they will be asked to come before the Administrative Board, Mr Harris said. Penalties may include a warning or probation, and some students may be exonerated, he said. No specific cases have been heard yet, he said.

The College Committee on Academic Integrity, which Harris leads, is preparing recommendations for reminding students of the importance of “academic honesty,” the school said. Harvard has orientation programs that focus on research and writing practices, such as integrity and appropriate citation, he said.

{ Sure,  to prepare them for Congress or a job in media, they will need to undersatnd “academic honesty } 

"We always stress academic integrity with our students," he said. "It's very hard to explain to someone that this raises ethical concerns and that it's not OK."

The large number of cases being investigated by the Administrative Board from a single class is "deeply disturbing," said Michael Smith, dean of Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences, which includes most of its undergraduate teachers. { deeply disturbing, where have we heard that phrase before? }

"At the same time, we must not forget that the vast majority of our students complete all their assignments honestly, diligently, and in accordance with our regulations and practices," he said in a letter to Harvard faculty, students and staff.

The committee will look at practices of other institutions that have faced cheating scandals, Harvard said. Security at sites administering the SAT and ACT tests in Nassau County, New York, was stepped up this year after students were found to have hired stand-ins to take the college entrance exams for them.

Source: Bloomberg

CONGRESSMAN ANTHONY WIENER