Moral / Ethical Dilemma Question

I agree but also disagree. I think I understand which details you’d call irrelevant and can imagine important context I’d like added, so that’s agreement.

But the formulation of the question is really much like real life. There will be details that should be irrelevant, but which will still gnaw at us. We will have unconscious biases encouraging us to choose one way or the other, and most of us will wind up introducing details partly on the basis of how they interact with our unconscious biases. Some of us will conclude that obviously we should point out the grading error, and some of us will conclude that of course we’re not going to do that, and we’ll use the same facts to get to those poles, we’ll just use them differently.

In fact, if you distill the OP down to the truly relevant details, it would read “You incorrectly receive a passing test grade. Do you point out the error?” Truly, this would not have been an engaging enough posting for many of us to engage with.

how can you be sure that the ‘mistake’ is not part of the test - and what you do when you discover said mistake is as important as the rest?

If you are 1 point away from failing - you have bigger questions to answer answer anyway and likely need to have “another semester” in training -

It’s not meant to be real life. If it was real life, the OP would/ could give the context.

It’s meant (as I alluded to) the typical “Ethical Dilemma” introduced in beginning philosophy class, which is terribly harmful, because it doesn’t teach ethics. It teaches the harmful, dangerous idea that in real life:

we have absolute knowledge and precision Action (the trolley Problem only works if that is true)

we only have two choices

Because These badly-formulated, not-questioned, “Ethical Dilemmas” are so wide-spread, People start to believe that in real life, too, we will have absolute knowledge and perfect precision, and that there will always be only two choices.

Which leads to things like “arming teachers to shoot back” because you will know who the shooter is in real life, and the only Options are to kill the shooter or be killed. It leads to shutting down looking for other alternatives, because there are only two. (There have been psychological tests done on that).

But the question isn’t presented as “Help me figure out how to find the ethical solution”, so we would Point out what’s lacking and why that’s important. It’s presented as classical Dilemma “What would you do”.

No. That’s why I pointed out all the missing Facts. The fact that in the US, it’s likely to be a trap, which removes the whole ethical question. The fact that if Bob passes by one Point, he’s unsuited for that Job. The fact that if Bob has been taught Integrity as highest value, he’s been taught wrong anyway.

All those Facts are not mentioned, so how many take them into account when coming to their decision?

No. Context changes that question every time. If Bob is a woman or Person of colour in US, and wants to be a cop to Change this culture from within, how do we know that all testees were given the same test? Maybe the female/ black testees got the Alabama literacy Version, and the other testees got the "write your Name here " Version. In that case, I would advise for not pointing it out.
If the context is that it’s not the US, but a modern Country, where Police School takes 3 years, with mid-exams every half-year, and Bob got A’s all the time, but barely scraped by with 1 Point above D on the final? I would go not to the teacher, but the director, and want to know what’s up.
If Bob got D’s all the time, I want to know what his teachers did to Change this, or why he didn’t drop out if he was unsuited obviously before finals.
If all mid-terms were graded by the teachers, who like Bob as the son of a fellow officer, but the final is state-administered and graded by Outsiders, I would be less surprised as to why Bob went from As to a D.

And so on. Answers Change depending on the context.

And a second warning for introducing your pet bug-a-boo about hating the US into a completely unrelated thread.

Go for the trifecta. I dare you.

Who pays for people to attend police academy?

My department did. You are paid as a police recruit. Once you completed training, your pay structure changed.

To answer a question above…

In my academy (80s) you were given 1 or 2 and sometimes 3 exams a week based on the subject matter you learned during the week. If you failed an exam, you were allowed to re-take one time. If you passed, you moved on. If you failed, you were booted. During the 6 month academy, you could only fail and re-take 4 tests. If you failed a 5th test, you were booted.

At the end of the 6 month academy, the recruit was given one final state exam administered from someone from the state. If you passed, it was all good. If you failed, you were booted, no re-takes.

I’m retired now so some of this may have changed, but I don’t believe so

Are you already working there and then get paid to go to the academy? Or you are recruited off the street and sent to the academy on their dime?

For my department…An academy is announced (30-45 positions depending on the budget) and you apply for one of the positions. You then go through several stages including.

  1. Initial Interview
  2. 2nd interview
  3. Physical Fitness (booted if requirements are not met)
  4. Drug test (booted if test is failed)
  5. Polygraph (booted if the test shows deception)
  6. Psych Exam (booted if you’re too crazy)
  7. Final interview for which a conditional offer of employment is given.

If the recruit accepts the offer, he/she becomes a city employee about a week before the academy begins. At that time, they are fitted with clothes, shoes/boots etc…If at any time during the academy you are booted for any reason then it’s as if your were terminated from a job. Your seat is empty the next day.

Once you complete the academy, you go from Recruit status to Trainee Status which is a bump in pay. You then complete a 6 week Field Training Program with an FTO at which point you go from Trainee to Police Officer 1 which is another bump in pay.

At this point, you just decide what you want to do in law enforcement meaning, what career path do you want to take.