Pegging self worth to grades is one of the worst things smart people do to themselves. I think it's really destructive.

I feel like that was directed at me. I could be wrong and just oversensitive, but this is an issue I'm working on.

vw, I think Buffistas in general tend to be the type of people who are (or were) a little too grade-happy. Or are always looking for the gold star for their achievements. God knows *I* am the classic gold-star girl.

Grade Whores Unite!

Ummmm, that being said. I have a problem with plaigarism. If I'm aware a classmate is passing someone else's work off as their own, I have no problem calling them on it. Many of our assignments are team projects and I don't want anything resembling plaigarized material in one of my papers.

The offense would have to be genuinely harmful to a person or institution rather than just an offense against the abstract principles of Justice and Fair Play.

And do you see the principle of Loyalty to Peers as less abstract?

Because speaking just for myself, my peers have to earn my loyalty like anyone else. Just because we're all in class together doesn't mean I've got their backs.

wrod. this. Of course being, well, poor and a little bit desperate at various times in my life has changed my feelings on a lot of stuff, I think.

And I am a bit of a grade whore

I don't think there is a cure for this one. At least none I've found yet.

Leaving aside the question of curves and the effect on students who are really doing the work, teachers who are actually trying to teach, and schools which are trying to maintain an academic reputation, I will argue that it hurts people in the long run, by allowing those students to get away with shit and not be called on it, profit by it, and eventually be elected President.

Er, hypothetically.

And I am a bit of a grade whore

For that I'm giving you an "A", or an "O" if you prefer that grading scale.

Informing on somebody just sits wrong with me. The offense would have to be genuinely harmful to a person or institution rather than just an offense against the abstract principles of Justice and Fair Play.

But it *is* genuinely harmful to persons and institutions if at some point it comes to light that, gee, people were getting away with cheating at institution X for YEARS. It devalues the institution's status and the status of the non-cheater's degree.

And this has what, exactly, to do with seeing cheating and thinking it's wrong enough to do something about?

I'm specifically addressing the issue of grade-curves where somebody else cheating is negatively affecting your grade. Definitely a tangent, but related to Jen's point about what you learn vs. what grade you get. What is genuinely valuable.

I feel like that was directed at me.

Sorry, ms. bug. I do know it's something we've talked about here, and I don't mean to target you directly. The whole conversation is actually more pointed at you than I intend or is fair. I really had in mind a whole lot of people who flourished in an academic environment but floundered once they got away from the immediate reinforcements of grades.

In any event, I trust you to be an ethical person who acts on her conscience.

"Cheating is wrong because it's not honest."-abstract Cheating by fucking up vw's lab report- concrete wronging. just my two cents. FTR, I've never cheated in school.