I sang this to my Russian Blue cat once, after having listened to it on a CD in the car. It kind of scared her, especially the “Hi!” part.
Maybe stupid cheaters should be forced to listen to me sing a medley of Tom Lehrer songs? That would drive down the incidence of cheating… 
…And drive UP the number of human rights violations complaints. 
Oh, so you’ve heard me singing!
About as horrible as mine, I expect…
Not really, because if the prof had simply taken the book away from him on sight and let him take the exam, there would have been no consequence for attempting to cheat: next year, all the smart and amoral people would have brought prepared materials becuse hey, if the prof notices and takes it away in advance, you’re no worse off than if you hadn’t tried.
Nope. The student had many chances to not cheat, and blatantly did so. When called on it, he had another chance to (potentially) avoid expulsion. If he had said what he was doing and claimed he misread the policy, he might have only failed that test. Instead, he stupidly tried to continue cheating the system.
Good riddance. We don’t need lawyers like that.
I had a couple of professors who used different techniques to avoid the blue book loading problem.
One professor would tell us to number the pages in the top right-hand corner, then would tell us to tear out a random page, and then tell us to start our exam on a specific page. There was no opportunity to load the blue book ahead of time.
Another professor told us at the beginning of the semester that we had to bring in X number of blue books, each with our name, class days and times. When he handed out the exams, he had our names on the exam and our blue books paper-clipped to the exam.
I always thought it was kind of pathetic that the professors had to go to so much trouble to prevent cheating.
[QUOTE=iamthewalrus(:3=]
Nope. The student had many chances to not cheat, and blatantly did so. QUOTE]
If the Prof had simply said to the student, “what’s with the book?” there is no issue. Mr. X wasn’t hiding the material, maybe it was a misunderstanding. I still stand by my assertion that the Prof was a friggin’ arse. If Mr. X was really trying to cheat, why was the book in clear sight, why didn’t he even try to conceal the book. This smacks me more along the lines of, students uses a pen on a scantron that doesn’t read pen. Prof. sees this happening and says nothing. At the end of the exam period, announces to class and student, “this moron used a pen, now he fails, ha ha.” Or, what about the test t-shirts that have been mentioned earlier, student enters exam wearing a “test t-shirt” with law book stuff printed on it. Student doesn’t HIDE the t-shirt, Prof clearly sees the t-shirt, allows student to begin test wearing the t-shirt. Prof waits ten minutes into test to “announce” that the student will automatically fail test, and law school and life. What a dick.
I don’t even know how all of you keep insisting this was a case of cheating. The student didn’t HIDE his use of the book. One would have to assume that they thought it was acceptable. If it wasn’t, the prof should have mentioned it BEFORE the exam, when he saw it. This is not a case of the Prof seeing a crib sheet, or some such cheating apparatus; this student apparently carried the book in in plain sight of the world, and used it openly. Essentially, there was nothing to “catch” the student at.
With mine, they don’t write in the blue books ahead of time, but the occasional plagiarist will write copied stuff into it during the exam. They think they can fool me by writing the introduction and conclusion on their own…but when a student with atrocious writing skills suddenly produces several body paragraphs that are far beyond their abilities, it’s more than a little obvious what they’ve been up to.
At least where I am, all I have to do is produce copies of the blue book or essay in question along with print-outs of the material they stole from various websites and cobbled together. Then I fill out a very short form, send it all off to Student Life, and let them take it from there. First timers get the chance to go to a workshop (sort of like traffic school) if they want to keep the incident from being seen by anyone else; repeat offenders get suspended for a year.
It’s not as if I don’t spend time (a whole damn week at the beginning of the semester) telling people what the consequences are and how easy it is for us to Google suspicious papers. They’ve had plenty of warning. They never fight it because they know there’s no point, and I’ve got the evidence.
[allegory]
So I went to the convenience store the other day and some guy picked up a six-pack of beer and walked out the door with it, and the clerk called the cops on his ass! Can you believe it? It wasn’t like he was trying to HIDE the six-pack. One would have to assume that the guy thought walking out without paying was acceptable. If it wasn’t, the clerk should have said “Don’t take beer without paying” BEFORE the guy walked into the store. This isn’t the case of the clerk seeing a false pocket in the guy’s trousers or some such shoplifting apparatus; this guy carried out the beer in plain sight of the world. Essentially, there was nothing to “catch” the guy at.
[/allegory]
The prof said handwritten notes were OK, so the guy brought in a shrink-wrapped book. Oh, and then lied to the professor’s face about what it was. Good God man, I don’t and shouldn’t have to tell my students that some things are unacceptable. Bringing books into an exam without express permission and lying to the professor about it should be no-brainers. Especially for freakin’ law students.
Not the same thing AT ALL.
If the book wasn’t legal to use, and the prof saw it being brought in and thought it was going to be used and then saw the guy using it, he should have said something then and avoided the ignorance that followed. It is POSSIBLE that Mr. X had misinterpreted the policy. It would have expended nearly zero effort for the prof to question the book when he first saw it and avoid the ugliness that followed.
WHY wait 5 minutes??? This is the part that sends the dickhead-o-meter off the dial. If the book was a problem, fuggin say so. The ONLY reason to wait 5-minutes is to be a prick. If the prof doesn’t allow books, cool, it’s his class, his policy, bully for him, but there is no reason to be a dickhead. Disallowing the book is fair. Waiting 5-minutes is assholish.
[allegory]
So I went to the grocery store the other day and some guy had a case of pop in his cart at the check-out. The clerk saw it there, and didn’t ring it up. The guy paid for his groceries and as he walked out the door, and the clerk called the cops on his ass! Can you believe it? It wasn’t like he was trying to STEAL the pop. One would have to assume that the guy thought the cashier rung it up, the cashier clearly saw the pop. This isn’t the case of the clerk seeing a false pocket in the guy’s trousers or some such shoplifting apparatus; this guy had the pop in plain sight of the world. The clerk didn’t ring it up. Essentially, there was nothing to “catch” the guy at.
[/allegory]
so the alternative hypothesis is that he is an utter screaming moron who cannot follow directions…
Morons shouldn’t pass law school.
Then call him a moron, not a cheater…
Prof’s still a dick.
It is indeed possible, but not credible, that Mr. X had misinterpreted the policy.
It is possible, and quite credible, that it is not the professor’s resposibility to hold the student’s hand and repeat the rules at every opportunity. It is possible and credible that the professor expects law students to be able to understand clearly stated rules that were, by Aangelica’s account, rigorously and frequently enforced. It is possible and credible that the professor expects students who already have an undergraduate degree to have enough brain cells to be able to distinguish between “notes and outlines you, personally, prepared by hand” and “shrink-wrapped books”.
And it is possible and highly damned likely that if Mr. X had truly misinterpreted the stated exam policy he would not have looked the professor in the eye and tried to claim that a book he had taken out of the shrink-wrap five minutes ago were his course notes.
Oh, bullshit. It is the professor’s responsibility not only to enforce the rules, but to ensure that those students who pass his class are those who are equipped to be lawyers. Mr. X, at best, wildly misinterpreted a clearly stated rule and then lied to the professor about it, and that’s if you believe Mr. X is too stupid to understand the meaning of the words “hand-written”. At worst, (and most likely) Mr. X was dishonest and a cheat. The professor was well within his purview to make an example of Mr. X. And waiting five minutes to call him out just gave Mr. X enough rope to hang himself with.
It is not the professor’s responsibility to coddle the students. It is the student’s responsibility to make sure they understand the stated rules before the exam begins, and it is the student’s responsibility to follow the stated rules. If Mr. X had left the book untouched, we might be able to argue that he had done nothing wrong. But he opened it, he used it, and that’s when his failure of responsibility was most evident.
Please. You’re comparing willful deceipt on the part of the clerk to the professor enforcing clearly stated and well-known rules. Unless Mr. X was the legal version of Doogie Howser, he was an adult. If he can’t or won’t follow the rules that’s his own damned problem.
Not at all. His lying demonstrates that he did know the policy - why else would he have made that ham-handed attempt?
The world would be better if we did this everywhere. But among law students, who are supposed to be ethical enough to run our justice system? Good riddance. People don’t deserve sympathy when they create their own problems.
I appear to be alone here, but I don’t see the need or benefit to intentionally be a dick. Saying nothing and then waiting five-minutes is purely and clearly only serving the purpose of over-handed assholery. If the guy was cheating, call him on it and kick him out. If you can avoid an ugly situation, why wouldn’t you?
What great harm would have occurred had the prof said to Mr. X, “That purchased book is not acceptable. You can’t use it.” Mr. X would have passed or failed on his own abilities. If he was a moron, he would have failed himself. If he was truly incapable and unworthy of becoming a lawyer, it would have been evidenced in his test score.
I just don’t see that what this guy did was in anyway equivalent to the situations described by the OP or earlier by others.
I agree completely. There is no reason for this prof to wait five minutes before calling out the student. It just makes me want to smack that prof a good one upside the head.
I think the prof should have called him out as soon as he started using the book, and should have warned him that using the book was not acceptable when he came in with the book.
But I don’t have a problem with what the professor did- just with how he did it.
Oh, I can think of a few reasons. It probably provided endless entertainment and snickers among his classmates. It will go down in law school history as “this idiot who got expelled” and the chances anyone else will do the same went down. It provided information that the prof was not going to coddle law students (who shouldn’t be coddled). It informed everyone to take good care when reading the syllabus, and proved that the consequence might be public humillation.
Frankly, as a “older” college student, I’m quite ashamed of the accomodations and coddling that goes on, as well as the sense of entitlement. The student was entitled to, and got, the same information as the rest of the class. He chose to either not read it or not take it seriously. No one else needed to be reminded that their notes needed to be hand written.
I think I’m in love with Aangelica’s professor. That was a great story!
Failing a course is, I think, an appropriate punishment for completely disregarding the rules and then lying about it in law school. If he had admitted what he was trying to use and put it away, or revealed that he just had no idea of what was allowed, maybe he should have been given a chance to pass… but he didn’t! He actually had the balls and the lack of brains to lie about it! Really, I am all for harsh penalties in medical schools and law schools, since such idiocy in the professions can easily leave people wrongfully imprisoned or dead.
Expelling him and telling all the other schools seems a bit much… but it was the school administration that made that decision, not Professor Hardass. The fact that the school took such drastic action indicates that there was probably a good deal more going on than we know about, and that the rest of the law school administration thought this guy had done something pretty bad, too. Bad enough that they didn’t want to take any more of his tuition money. I’m guessing that this guy must have had some history, or that he’d tried to keep up the pretense of these being his own personal handwritten class notes in front of the higher-ups.