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An industry that helps Chinese cheat their way into and through US colleges

reuters.com

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Re: An industry that helps Chinese cheat their way into and through US colleges

#91

Post by steve-howard »

qrendel wrote: post #54
s_baby wrote: post #27

The international students have unreasonably high standards for maintaining financial assistance and staying out of academic probation(3.5-3.8 at my university). By design college courses give work just a little beyond what a student can reasonably accomplish(with a "good" grade) and curve accordingly. These kids aren't just cheating they are marginalizing students who are honest or don't have this kind of social acc…

> If you're not part of a fraterntiy/sorority that archives coursework/tests of previous students or part of an international student in-group then you can easily fall through the cracks from this grade deflation effect. That is a huge problem for a lot of us more introverted types, especially if you're a transfer student from another school. I remember taking a bunch of classes where I didn't know anyone and had no…

That really hurt when I was taking Discrete Math. Extremely challenging course, and I'd put in 10 hours a week on the homework and still have a few that I just couldn't figure out. Practically cried when I saw people copying answers just before class. Unusually for a university course, the homework was worth about 60% of the grade.

I saw a fair amount of cheating in college. It really sucked to be competing with people who had an easy way out that wasn't even available to me.

Re: An industry that helps Chinese cheat their way into and through US colleges

#92

Post by tristor »

raincom wrote: post #38

Instead of looking at the issue morally, one can see what it boils down to: learning vs credentialing This shows that one wants a credential, but does not want to learn. There are tons of people out there who precisely want that.

And it's also precisely anathema to the purpose of a university. It's especially infuriating if people are doing it while studying CS or similar engineering topics, because in most cases the job market doesn't require the credentials only the skills and their cheating is causing grade deflation for people who actually put forth effort.

Re: An industry that helps Chinese cheat their way into and through US colleges

#93

Post by fatman13gg »

> U.S. universities offer an easier way to get ahead, with a quality education and better job prospects.

The better job prospects part might not be true. Those came back to China for jobs will get their current position with or without a U.S. degree.

Re: An industry that helps Chinese cheat their way into and through US colleges

#94

Post by nilkn »

qrendel wrote: post #54
s_baby wrote: post #27

The international students have unreasonably high standards for maintaining financial assistance and staying out of academic probation(3.5-3.8 at my university). By design college courses give work just a little beyond what a student can reasonably accomplish(with a "good" grade) and curve accordingly. These kids aren't just cheating they are marginalizing students who are honest or don't have this kind of social acc…

> If you're not part of a fraterntiy/sorority that archives coursework/tests of previous students or part of an international student in-group then you can easily fall through the cracks from this grade deflation effect. That is a huge problem for a lot of us more introverted types, especially if you're a transfer student from another school. I remember taking a bunch of classes where I didn't know anyone and had no…

> I'd come in and the entire rest of the class would be sitting around sharing their homework answers, copying each other on the ones they couldn't figure out, getting help from each other...

This is actually one of the reasons I frequently avoided study groups for many of my math classes in college. There was too much of an emphasis on just getting the answers from each other, which meant you might get a decent score on the homework but not on the tests. What's worse, you wouldn't develop a true understanding for the material, which would hinder you in later and more advanced courses.

It was definitely a lot more work for me to labor through every problem myself, but I ended up at the top of almost every math class I took, and I really do believe that my avoidance of the study groups was part of this. They were just toxic to a degree. If I really hit a stumbling block and needed help, I'd go to the TA or the professor, who were always extremely helpful because it was obvious I'd put in real effort and wasn't just seeking a quick answer.

I will say that this approach backfired in one case -- a course on advanced integration theory with extremely difficult problem sets, no exams, a very old professor who was brilliant but not very good at all at interacting with or helping students (his lectures were quite bad too and his handwriting illegible), and an invisible, incredibly harsh grader who was not available for advice at all. Doing every problem myself was too much of a burden and I got my first and only B in a math class ever because I didn't join in on the study groups. A year later I met up with some students from that class who learned that I had done every problem myself, and they were collectively in shock and awe due to the length and difficulty of the problem sets.

Re: An industry that helps Chinese cheat their way into and through US colleges

#95

Post by thesimpsons1022 »

tdeck wrote: post #89
mrep wrote: post #53

I went to a public university with a large international population and this doesn't surprise me in the slightest. A lot of the international students were extremely poor at english. One of the guys on my software project team was an international student who confirmed that it was very easy to pay someone to take the english proficiency exam. Us Americans aren't so innocent though. The amount of adderall/vyvanse/rita…

These types of discussions always depress me. You'd think from reading them that everyone has cheated or popped some Adderall at some point, and it's a normal part of college. Is that really true? I never have, unless you count making up excuses for turning in the occasional thing late. I worked hard in school and got decent but not amazing grades (3.7 something). When I hear this shit it makes me feel like I was pla…

I think it is essentially true. I recently graduated and definitely 99.9 pct of students cheated/took adderral at some point in their studies.

Re: An industry that helps Chinese cheat their way into and through US colleges

#96

Post by thesimpsons1022 »

netheril96 wrote: post #84
leroy_masochist wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but they also want their young people to get the best quality education available, especially in STEM, which is currently (and probably not forever) disproportionately situated in America.

Only a small fraction of the Chinese admitted into Harvard, MIT, Princeton and Stanford return after their education. Neither does most of Google and Facebook employees who are born in China. The brightest talents of China serve the United States mostly (even though the US places a lot of handicap on them, e.g. the cap on H1B). Can you now imagine why Chinese government is not incentivized?

what you have to consider is they will send money home and have many connections in China

Re: An industry that helps Chinese cheat their way into and through US colleges

#97

Post by ryao »

WWLink wrote: post #60
qrendel wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you're not part of a fraterntiy/sorority that archives coursework/tests of previous students or part of an international student in-group then you can easily fall through the cracks from this grade deflation effect. That is a huge problem for a lot of us more introverted types, especially if you're a transfer student from another school. I remember taking a bunch of classes where I didn't know anyone and had no…

In my experience the cheaters don't socialize outside their group at all. That's how it's so easy to tell the cheaters from the normal people! They won't. And if half your class is like that, well.. yeah :( My take on it: There's no solutions manual for building stuff in real life lol.

> There's no solutions manual for building stuff in real life lol.

That is unless you are this guy:

http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/17/business/us-outsource-job-chin...

Re: An industry that helps Chinese cheat their way into and through US colleges

#99

Post by alistproducer2 »

jdavis703 wrote: post #68
s_baby wrote: post #27

The international students have unreasonably high standards for maintaining financial assistance and staying out of academic probation(3.5-3.8 at my university). By design college courses give work just a little beyond what a student can reasonably accomplish(with a "good" grade) and curve accordingly. These kids aren't just cheating they are marginalizing students who are honest or don't have this kind of social acc…

A 3.5 is easy. I got a a 3.82 at my school of engineering, while working, and commuting for about 4 hours per day. I didn't really even try that hard in school.

Congrats, you're my first down vote. Seriously though, here you either add to the conversation or perish. Bragging about your GPA is not only childish, but completely irrelevant to prett much everything....in life.
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