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Professor's Viral Lecture on Ethics Compels (Innocent?) Cheaters to Confess

by Warren Riddle on November 21, 2010 at 01:00 PM

richard quinnUniversity of Central Florida professor Richard Quinn has been a professional educator for over 20 years. Despite his decades of experience, Quinn recently delivered an unprecedented lecture that he "hoped [he] would never have to give." Prior to the lecture (which is currently going viral), Quinn had grown concerned about widespread cheating after he recognized an unlikely pattern in his class's grade distribution. Concerned students also supposedly hinted that people may have received advance copies of the most recent examination.

Quinn and his lab assistants performed forensic and statistical analysis, and believed with "95-percent" certainty they could identify the inordinate number of cheaters. The professor then gave the dreaded lecture, during which he offered the perpetrators a choice. They could clean their records -- by turning themselves in, retaking the test and attending an ethics seminar -- or they could face expulsion with a permanently tainted academic record. Quinn's ultimatum worked -- to some degree -- because more than 200 students came forward.

One significant problem has materialized in this supposedly redemptive tale, though. The students might not have actually cheated. According to Tech Dirt, the students didn't steal and circulate an actual exam; they simply referenced "the textbook publisher's 'testbank' of questions." Since Quinn had personally indicated (earlier in the semester, on video) that he wrote his own test questions, the students likely believed the testbank wouldn't provide the upcoming exam's actual answers.

So, while at first the video may have seemed to feature contrite students learning about ethics, it may just boil down to innocent students responding to intimidation and abject terror.

Tags: cheating, college, education, ethics, RichardQuinn, students, top, UniversityOfCentralFlorida

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