Every student has been there. Your teacher assigns you a long term assignment that requires you to read a 300- plus page book on your own and write a multi-page paper regarding a certain aspect of the novel.

Week one goes by and you figure, “I still have a ton of time, why bother to begin.” The same thought process occurs for week two and three, but then you come across the deadly thought of, “I only have a few days to do this assignment and I haven’t even begun.” But that does not encourage you, because after all, you still have the entire weekend and seven days to complete it.

Suddenly, the assignment is due tomorrow. You have not read a single word or even written your name at the top of the page. Sparknotes. It is your only savior. You read up the gist of your novel, Google a few things, and within only three hours’ time, you have a decent, three and a half to four page paper that you hand in and receive a B+. You passed. In fact, you did more than pass-you surpassed simply “passing.”

Whether teachers want to admit it or not, they know that their students are not all faithfully doing their work and doing what is asked of them, but manage to pass various assignments, classes, and even grade levels. It is becoming more and more common for students to be able to say that they barely did any work in a class, have cheated, shared their work with others, or even plagiarized, but are still receiving passing grades while their wrong doings go unnoticed.

This seemingly widespread epidemic is also unfair to the students that do their work and earn their grades all the while competing against and also receiving the same grades as students who cut corners and are mistakenly rewarded for doing so.

VHS English teacher Mrs. Young feels that although it is hard to tell when a student has not done all that he or she is required to, there are sometimes a few dead giveaways or red flags that she comes across while grading or overlooking her students’ work.

“I think [in the case of] an essay test or an essay, if I feel when I read it, that something is lacking in the depth of the analysis, I know that the person hasn’t read the work. Usually, I can tell something is off when papers are disjointed. I find myself reading the paper and going ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’”

Mrs. Young said that she has made efforts to prevent students from cutting corners with their work by asking, on certain occasions, for quotes and evidence of the statements her students make, and also by giving in class essays which she says are “virtually impossible to cheat on.”

In response to being asked if VHS English teacher, Mr. White, had ever had the sense that a student of his was cheating, he said:

“Sometimes students give away that they’ve cheated just because the writing style is so different from what they usually produce. But [what is tough, is that] a “sense” doesn’t cut it. We have to prove it; we have to produce the source document which I have a few times in my career, but I’m certain there are lots of other times kids got away with it.”

One way Mr. White holds kids accountable for actually reading outside of class is to give reading quizzes to his students, but in the same breath, feels that he is just sending the message: “Read or there will be punishment.” He believes that this is simply “a lousy way of trying to get kids to read.”

“I want to foster a love of reading. But that’s the idealistic and naïve book-lover side of me. The 25-year practical English teacher part of me says “Yeah right, pal – love of reading, that’s cute, better give the quiz!” And with writing, unless I am part of every step, which is logistically impossible – the student always has an opportunity to cheat. In the end, you just have to trust that [the students] will do the right thing.”

Another obstacle aiding students in cheating is the fact that they use their cell phones, even during tests.  In this day and age, students are finding it easier and easier to hide and use their phones during class. One VHS senior said that they simply hid their phone during a test one time, Googled the first question, gained access to the entire test, answer key included, and “earned” a very pretty grade in the end of it all.

“I’ve been getting around doing all of the work on assignments since freshman year,” admits another student, “All of my friends do it too.”

Finding a single student in VHS who can honestly admit to ever standing up against the overwhelming temptation to cheat over the course of their high school career, is nearly impossible.

The most surprising thing about the devastating majority of students who do admit to cheating, sharing work, ‘cutting corners’ and even plagiarizing, is that most of them have never been caught.

In Mr. White’s eyes, the worst part of students cheating and getting away with it is that the “grades students lust for and have learned to get so often don’t mean anything. The great irony is that the thing we teach best is being good at “being a student.” Which basically means figuring out how to play the system to get good grades. But students operate in a system in which the only thing that is rewarded is the bottom line – grades, and they know that. Grades become GPA, which gets me into college, which gets me a good job, which gets me the money to live a comfortable life. I don’t have to “learn” anything; I just have to get good grades. So the educational system is responsible for sort of creating this monster. But it shortchanges kids who get through school, but have honed no real skills.”

Although it is disheartening from a teacher’s standpoint, Mrs. Young explained how she knows it is not something students can continue to do as they progress through life.

“In the long run, it will catch up with [you]. Once you get into the workplace, you can’t keep cheating your way through. You have to perform. You have to put out a product. It’s going to catch up with you, someday.”