Several years ago, Groveton College adopted an honor code, which calls for students to agree not to cheat in their academic endeavors and to notify a faculty member if they suspect that others have cheated. Groveton's honor code replaced a system in which teachers closely monitored students. Under that system, teachers reported an average of thirty cases of cheating per year. The honor code has proven far more successful: in the first year it was in place, students reported twenty-one cases of cheating; five years later, this figure had dropped to fourteen. Moreover, in a recent survey, a majority of Groveton students said that they would be less likely to cheat with an honor code in place than without. Such evidence suggests that all colleges and universities should adopt honor codes similar to Groveton's. This change is sure to result in a dramatic decline in cheating among college students.
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the recommendation is likely to have the predicted result. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the recommendation.
It is argued that all universities and colleges should follow the example of Groveton College to adopt an honor code in order to reduce the cases of cheating. A number of questions about the cheating cases, the reasons why fewer cases of cheating were reported and how representative Groveton is among universities have to be answered in order to decide if the recommendation and the argument are reasonable.
To begin with, we need to know more about the details of the cheating cases among Groveton students to decide if the honor code is likely to be effective. For example, we need to know if students are likely to keep their promises not to cheat during their studies given the pressure of performing well. If the students are under great pressure to do well academically, they may cheat despite their promises under the honor code. In addition, we need to know if students are more likely to detect the cases of cheating than teachers. For example, in close-book exams, maybe students can discover cheating cases of their
peers around them more easily; but in paper-based assignments, teachers will detect cheating more easily with anti-plagiarism software such as Turnitin.
In addition, we also need to know why the number of reported cases of cheating was reduced after the adoption of honor code. We need more evidence about how likely students are to report their peers’ cheating cases. Maybe the students are reluctant to report the cases under peer pressure, thereby reducing the number of reported cases when the actual number of cheating cases was higher. If the decrease of reported cases is a result of the students’ reluctance to report, the honor code would actually be ineffective in deterring cheating. Another possible reason for the decline of cheating cases could be the reduction of enrolments of the college, which we need to explore with more evidence.
Finally, it is important to ask to what extent the other universities and colleges are comparable to Groveton and the honor code would be acceptable among the students and faculty members. Maybe the honor code is effective in Groveton as students there are not under great pressure to perform well or most of them are strongly motivated and well prepared for the assessments. This may not be the case for students in other universities or colleges. Moreover, for the honor code to work, both students and faculty members need to accept it as a legitimate and viable system. Groveton students and faculty may find the system acceptable but those from other universities and colleges may not.
In conclusion, we do not know whether the recommendation would be effective and whether the argument is reasonable until we can gather more information to answer the questions discussed above.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
flaws:
need to argue against the 'survey'
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 18 15
No. of Words: 460 350
No. of Characters: 2266 1500
No. of Different Words: 174 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.631 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.926 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.663 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 159 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 125 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 102 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 37 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 25.556 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 6.685 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.778 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.408 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.633 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.262 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, finally, if, may, moreover, so, well, for example, in addition, in conclusion, such as, to begin with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 26.0 19.6327345309 132% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 19.0 12.9520958084 147% => OK
Conjunction : 16.0 11.1786427146 143% => OK
Relative clauses : 3.0 13.6137724551 22% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 22.0 28.8173652695 76% => OK
Preposition: 75.0 55.5748502994 135% => OK
Nominalization: 12.0 16.3942115768 73% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2331.0 2260.96107784 103% => OK
No of words: 460.0 441.139720559 104% => OK
Chars per words: 5.06739130435 5.12650576532 99% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.6311565067 4.56307096286 101% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.77670144028 2.78398813304 100% => OK
Unique words: 186.0 204.123752495 91% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.404347826087 0.468620217663 86% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 751.5 705.55239521 107% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 10.0 4.96107784431 202% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 3.0 8.76447105788 34% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 2.70958083832 74% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 18.0 19.7664670659 91% => OK
Sentence length: 25.0 22.8473053892 109% => OK
Sentence length SD: 45.4299080255 57.8364921388 79% => OK
Chars per sentence: 129.5 119.503703932 108% => OK
Words per sentence: 25.5555555556 23.324526521 110% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.77777777778 5.70786347227 119% => OK
Paragraphs: 6.0 5.15768463074 116% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 9.0 6.88822355289 131% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 1.0 4.67664670659 21% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.300408329747 0.218282227539 138% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.124556470897 0.0743258471296 168% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0723835837119 0.0701772020484 103% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.149152244245 0.128457276422 116% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.115249117627 0.0628817314937 183% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.2 14.3799401198 106% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 46.1 48.3550499002 95% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.0 12.197005988 107% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.42 12.5979740519 99% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.14 8.32208582834 98% => OK
difficult_words: 95.0 98.500998004 96% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.0 11.1389221557 108% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.