quote:

Do you prefer a child leaving school because he/she could not make it without cheating? Or because he/she felt frustrated for ages being the less good student of the class just because didn't cheat?

Yes I do. They would have their honor intact, instead of doing whatever it takes to get ahead. If making money is the only moral good, then go ahead, cheat, lie, get ahead by trampeling over the backs of others.

It's a personal choice- why blame society for your choices?

Well said, Bill!

By the way, at my last job in the US where I was an executive my bosses expected me to cheat on some statistics so the stock price would remain high. (This is simplifying of course.) I would not do it and my job was in jeopardy. I retained an attorney, quit the job and it all worked out OK but it was the hardest time I ever had in my career. I never regretted my stand on the issue.

Why don't you report me, Bill?
You want to fight this rotten system, right?
So start to do your duty, otherwise you're my accomplice.

I have publicly ammited that I have cheated.
I cheated on my science exam in the highschool, on the astronomy chapter. I cannot remember the planets of the solar system by their distance from Earth, I didn't deserve to pass that science test. Perhaps if I failed it I would haven't passed the year. I would have felt discouraged and quit school before my diploma. Without a diploma I could haven't attended an university course. Do you think I deserve an engineering degree? (btw, I can still name the 7 kings of Rome )

I could go on forever.

Why don't you allow a certain flexibility?
Are Italian such bad workers because they cheated at school?

Rather than flailing around, why not examine why you still feel that cheating is justifiable? You cannot change the past- what's done is done. But you can change how you view cheating as a way to gain an advantage.

Perhaps if you encounter a similar choice in the future (for example, to fudge some numbers to meet a price point so your firm gets a project) you will make the right choice, not the most advantageous choice.

I do think that the choice between 'to cheat' or 'not to cheat' is - in the system we see here in Italy - not as clear cut as we would all wish it to be.

It is one thing to say YOU shouldn't cheat when in a class it is common knowledge that maybe one or two people are doing so....Then YOU are the 'non cheating' majority.

But the other side of THAT coin is that all those who DO cheat tell maybe just a couple of you who DON'T that you will never get anywhere if you choose not to follow their lead.

I KNOW THAT'S NOT RIGHT - but it's how it is. Standing up for what you believe when the odds are stacked so high against you cannot be easy - but it's something that people like Dierdre's daughter and Pola have had to face.

It's the fact that adults, who supposedly consent to these practices and continue to allow this system to flourish that is the problem - not so much all these poor kid's who are forced into this form of Hobson's Choice. The pressure should not be put on them but on their parents, teachers and school authorities to put a stop to it - NOW!!!

Yep - on it again - and proud to be....

In Italy, IT IS.
I am not saying it is right, but to me it's not that big issue cheating at school.

Some people simply cheat because are lazy: Annika didn't like history, I didn't like Latin. This does not mean that we are not able to study and understand it (= we don't deserve an high school diploma). However in my school system you are forced to study certain subjects, the program is not customizable. And you have to study very hard, and not simply taking a quiz every two weeks.

Finally, Italian school is really a world apart from the job sphere. You can cheat at school but you cannot fake your knowledge at work.
Although in my tests I have to memorize formulas, I would never rely only on my memory when projecting something. I would anyway check on books. Is this cheating?

quote:

Originally posted by Pola:
in my school system you are forced to study certain subjects, the program is not customizable. And you have to study very hard, and not simply taking a quiz every two weeks.

Finally, Italian school is really a world apart from the job sphere. You can cheat at school but you cannot fake your knowledge at work.

It's the same here.

Also, I did cheat in high school (or our equivalent there of) but I never cheated in college and I definitely haven't cheated in my current school. Why? Because I want to learn these things, I have chosen to take these classes and I'd be damned to cheat my way to a professional diploma. High school was just a passage to higher education, not a place where I learned a profession.

I think we're talking about different things here. AFAIK Ross is not yet in college. Those of us who are trying to explain this behavior are all talking about lower education, NOT college or university. Those of you who spill your guts over cheating take examples of doctors who got their license by cheating and so on.

Apples and pears, folks.

Personally, I have a problem with saying that it's justifiable to cheat if a school requires students to take subjects that they don't like or that won't give them practical knowledge for the workplace. It bothers me for two reasons, the first being that I don't subscribe to the idea of education as job training. I think that education should have as much to do with turning children and young adults into well-rounded individuals and good citizens as it does with turning them into worker bees (if not more.) The second problem I have with this line of reasoning is that it is relativistic. Who decides what is justifiable? One you begin to rationalize an inappropriate behavior, it becomes nearly impossible to enforce limits on it.

Is it really hard to be a good person in this world? D**n yes! It often means going against prevailing ideas. And sometimes the only reward is being able to live with a clean conscience.

Sorry, that was really moralistic. Am I turning into my parents?

quote:

Why don't you allow a certain flexibility?
Are Italian such bad workers because they cheated

Dishonesty is dishonesty.

If they feel it was justified cheating then, it's likely that there are situations where they will feel justified cheating in the future.

Are you willing to allow a 'certain flexibility' to a medical technician who, overloaded with a lot of tests to perform before he quits for the day, is preparing your lab report?

Are you willing to allow a 'certain flexibility' to an engineer who is building the bridge you will cross everyday?

Are you willing to allow a 'certain flexibility' in your marriage?

Are you willing to allow a 'certain flexibility' to how much your employer pays you?

I feel it is dishonest, it is cheating, for an employer pay his employees a salary that they cannot live on. But since all employers are doing it and all employees expect it, it has become OK.

Any worker, Italian or otherwise, is a bad worker when he/she cheats.

People cheat not because of the type of work they are doing (exams vs lab tests), but because of the values they hold.

-------------

Apples and pears? I don't think so.

Cheating in high school is cheating in high school. Cheating in college is cheating in college. Cheating is cheating.

Okay okay, I get the message. Chia, Pola - let's face it. We're despicable people with questionable morals and will always cheat in any possible moment because we did it as kids. There ain't no such thing as 'growing up' for a cheater.

What frightens me in all this is how judgmental so many people are.

Well, I don't judge whether you cheated or not - that's your business. But there's no justifying it regardless of where you did it or how old you were. No, you shouldn't be persecuted for mistakes you made when you were younger (we all made them) but why justify them? I think those of us getting really annoyed about these things are the ones who find it hard to operate in certain situations here where cheating is the norm to get ahead and the "nice guy" always finishes last.
Michelle

quote:

Originally posted by Annika:
Chia, Pola - let's face it. We're despicable people with questionable morals and will always cheat in any possible moment because we did it as kids.

But Chia wrote on the first page of the thread:
"There are good willing and average cultured people (me included)that in Italy went on without cheating or knowing anyone."

Oh. You're right. That means that it's just me and Pola who are despicable then. Sorry Chia!

That's exactly how I feel Michelle. I cheated once on a science test because I didn't study and I felt amazing pressure from my parents to get god grades. However, I'm not proud of it and did actually confess to my teacher and break down crying.

Even with the pressure I felt, I did not feel justified. I felt guilty beyond belief. I think that's what is missing here: the guilt. We all talked about how cheating was morally wrong and how we all knew it. Where's the guilt then? It sounds like you are trying to justify it just because you were lazy or everyone else does it. And that just helps the keep the mentality that cheating is ok alive.

It might be small now, but you'd be surprised how quickly the little things can get bigger.

Annika,
I don't think anyone is saying you are despicable. You aren't backed to the wall or with a bright light flashed in your face. If you cheated in the past, va bene. But I don't think there's any need to promote it or wear it proudly on a t-shirt. You seem to be a person who likes a certain amount of order, as we discussed on the Trenitalia thread. Think about your frustration with the Trenitalia site and imagine that perhaps it was not built by the best person for the job but by some Trenitalia executive's son who doesn't know what he's doing or some person who cheated his way through Web design school. There was an article about ineptitude and mediocrity in the newspaper this week - don't you think even a small part of that comes out of this cheating mentality? I do.
Michelle

Hey, I'm not as upset as I might sound This is not a discussion about me, I'm just trying to add depth to the discussion.

Actually I agree that cheating is bad, believe it or not - I just don't consider it worth wasting energy on. What matters is how you feel inside. I have never ever cheated on a boyfriend, because I couldn't live with myself if I did it. The guilt would eat me from within. I would never ever lie in my CV, because if I got the position because of it I would go to work every day feeling like sh*t - guilty because I honestly didn't deserve the job, scared that someone would find out the truth and so on.

I guess part of the reason for why I don't think it matters whether or not I cheated on a history exam is because I didn't get any favors because of it. It didn't get me into college, it didn't get me a job, I didn't earn money on it.

I still mean that there is a difference.

quote:

I didn't get any favors because of it. It didn't get me into college, it didn't get me a job,

Wait: you did get a favor - a grade!

If it didn't get you into college, if it didn't get you a job, then why didn't you just fail the course, go on to college, and get a job?

Please tell me where was I judgmental?

Actually it didn't even give me a grade, high school doesn't work like that here. I got into college thanks to a special 'college test' which you can't study for, can't cheat on, but which shows what you actually know.
I got into college and I got a job, thank you very much, and it was NOT something I didn't honestly deserve.

So why did I do it? Because I couldn't be bothered to study. I wrote little notes instead, but I rarely needed to use them because once I had written it down I remembered what they said. I could just as well have left the notes outside the room, but I didn't. Why? Well... I don't know. A teenager's revolution against adult rules?

What I see as judgmental is that anyone who has ever cheated on anything is a crook with questionable values who will continue this behavior. Perhaps this is only my interpretation and not what you meant, I don't know.

"Eatin ain't cheatin"

quote:

What I see as judgmental is that anyone who has ever cheated on anything is a crook with questionable values who will continue this behavior

Sorry - this comes from Human Performance Evaluation, which I have been trained in: "The ONLY useful and BEST predictor of an individual's future behavior is that individual's past behavior."

OOps...mi sono persa qualcosa?

nothing to add here (what I thought I already told:eg certain maestrini thread starters should be more accurate before getting into italian/European matters in the Land of contradictions and gray in such a tranching judgemental "black - white" way)except girls I love you!

A special kiss to Annika

Chia

Ok, I give up.
This might have to do with the fact that abroad your skills are recognized from the marks you get.
Here it does not work that way, so...