Cheating on nursing exams

Nurses General Nursing

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What would you do if you found out people were cheating on nursing exams? I don't mean just copying during the tests, but I've seen people share questions from the previous semester, since some professors use the exact same tests. They don't return the tests to the students, but they don't realize that when the tests are reviewed next class, some people write down the answers. Even if the professor tells everyone not to write anything, he or she cannot make sure everyone is not writing, esp. on laptops or PDAs, and it's a large class. Also, there is also the element of 'remembering' the questions right after the test. I myself and some friends can remember many questions afterward since we look in our notes for the answers, to see how we may have scored. But we do this for our own purposes and not to recreate the test. So what's to stop certain people from writing down whatever they remember then writing more during the test review. So the following semester they share with their friends.

I am doing well in all my classes since I study hard, but I just think it's not fair that certain students may simply memorize questions and answers and get high scores. It's not even about the scores, but what kind of nurses will they be, if they don't even grasp the material as a whole and are may just memorize questions.

I am not the only one who has seen this happen, but the professors don't realize that even though they don't return the test form to us, that students can either memorize or write down the questions/answers during review.

I know it's not nice to tell on people but do you think it's fair?

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Specializes in ER, Peds, Charge RN.

I suggest not worrying about what other people are doing. If they are cheating, it doesn't really matter too much. The only test that matters is the NCLEX, and they can't cheat on it. Really they are only doing a disservice to theirselves. I know it isn't fair.. but remember karma.

The instructors should really vary their questions from semester to semester to prevent this type of thing. Ours did, and people still found a way to cheat. The thing is, the one that cheated a lot still hasn't passed NCLEX, and that was over a year ago.

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I suggest not worrying about what other people are doing. If they are cheating, it doesn't really matter too much. The only test that matters is the NCLEX, and they can't cheat on it. Really they are only doing a disservice to theirselves. I know it isn't fair.. but remember karma.

The instructors should really vary their questions from semester to semester to prevent this type of thing. Ours did, and people still found a way to cheat. The thing is, the one that cheated a lot still hasn't passed NCLEX, and that was over a year ago.

You're right, that I shouldn't worry about them cheating. They will probably have a hard time on the NCLEX. But what bothers me is that whenever people do cheat, esp on a difficult exam and they get very high scores, it raises the total average. So if I got a relatively good grade, it seems rather poor compared to a very high grade, sometimes almost perfect. I don't know what the professor doesn't realize that it's not a normal bell curve of scores.

Also, I think it's bad for the school in general since more people will start to gossip about how students cheat here ,and when I do get to the real nursing world, I will be embarrassed to say what school I attended. I have a clean conscious that I didn't cheat, but people can form stereotypes and wonder if I was one of the cheaters.

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It seems to be a common occurence in other schools also. Like EDValerie said, don't worry about it. Mind what you're doing and don't let what others are doing bother you. One of our main objectives for going to nursing school is to prepare for the NCLEX. I don't think there will be any answer sharing for those exams so those who solely study from these things are doing themselves wrong.

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Specializes in General Nursing.

its true and its sad. like the big issue here on our place. we all wanted to work properly and the feeling u are having now really bothers.best thing to do is, jst ignore. be glad that u are doing the right thing. and surely, you'll gain a real success afterwards..:cheers:

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It seems to be a common occurence in other schools also. Like EDValerie said, don't worry about it. Mind what you're doing and don't let what others are doing bother you. One of our main objectives for going to nursing school is to prepare for the NCLEX. I don't think there will be any answer sharing for those exams so those who solely study from these things are doing themselves wrong.

It's scary that it's also happening in other schools. But how do we know for sure if these people can't find a way to cheat on the NCLEX? I had read some posts a while back about people sharing questions they remembered from NCLEX. Of course not everyone will get the same questions, but it's possible to have groups of people join together and share their questions, and eventually form a large collection of exact questions. At least some of those may be encountered on the NCLEX.

There was an incident like recently that in the Phillipines, where a group of students were found to have cheated on the licensing nursing exam. It was a big deal on the news, and some people want the nursing school where these students attended to close down.

What if something like this happens one day in one of our schools? Hopefully I'll be graduated by then, but that still leaves a bad reputation for the school which I will list on my resume.

Some students may not see this as a big deal, but it can get worse. It's just not right to have students cheat on exams that have to do with caring for people's health. It's not that I don't think it's fair,but the principle of the thing is wrong. It kind of down-grades the profession as a whole.

What would people think if they found out many medical students cheated on their tests? Would they have the same trust or respect for doctors?

Here's the article from the Phillipine nursing school scandal:

http://www.manilastandardtoday.com/?page=politics04_aug21_2006

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I graduated in May of this year..Some of my instructors did review the exams and I wrote them in my notes, the answers..That is not cheating if an instructor does not care if you take notes or not..As a matter of fact, many of my classmates did not even bother to reveiw their exams..The reason why I took notes because the same questions might be on the final exams...It was to benifit me on what I got wrong and what is right so I would gain the knowledge..I dont know where you are going at this but yes, exams are reviewed..If the instructors let you take notes or dont care what you do, then it is not cheating at all..

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True. Kaplan and those other review courses do exactly that...I believe they prepare people for the NCLEX based on what others are telling them about the tests. Besides, I'm hearing that the NCLEX focuses on the topics of ABC's, nursing care priority, safety, etc. The NCLEX is supposed to be the determining factor of one's worthiness to be a RN. I firmly believe that the majority of cheaters will be weeded out here.

Again, I wouldn't worry so much as to what others are doing. Your practice as an RN will overshadow whatever background or nursing school you came from.

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I graduated in May of this year..Some of my instructors did review the exams and I wrote them in my notes, the answers..That is not cheating if an instructor does not care if you take notes or not..As a matter of fact, many of my classmates did not even bother to reveiw their exams..The reason why I took notes because the same questions might be on the final exams...It was to benifit me on what I got wrong and what is right so I would gain the knowledge..I dont know where you are going at this but yes, exams are reviewed..If the instructors let you take notes or dont care what you do, then it is not cheating at all..

No, I'm not referring to taking notes during review of exams IF the professor allows it. I'm talking about when a professor Specifically orders the class to put away their pens, notebooks, and laptops, when reviewing exams. We are not allowed to take notes at all. This is because the professor does not want the questions to 'leak' out to other students who will take the test another semester. Same reason why we are not given the test questionnaires back.

Also, I'm not talking about taking notes for your own personal use for the finals, etc. I'm talking about people recreating the tests and answers and distributing them to their friends (or sometimes selling) to students for the next semester who will take that same class. This way they don't have to study so hard and maybe not much at all, since they just memorize the exact questions and answers on the exam.

If a person gets an exam ahead of time, and memorizes the answers it IS very much cheating.

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True. Kaplan and those other review courses do exactly that...I believe they prepare people for the NCLEX based on what others are telling them about the tests. Besides, I'm hearing that the NCLEX focuses on the topics of ABC's, nursing care priority, safety, etc. The NCLEX is supposed to be the determining factor of one's worthiness to be a RN. I firmly believe that the majority of cheaters will be weeded out here.

Again, I wouldn't worry so much as to what others are doing. Your practice as an RN will overshadow whatever background or nursing school you came from.

Kaplan uses questions that are 'similar' to those on NCLEX, but not EXACT questions taken from NCLEX. That is against copyright laws and is considered cheating, and a person can have their license revoked for sharing questions they remembered from the test. My friend took the test last spring and told me she signed a form saying she would not in any shape or form share questions from the test. This means that there is 1 specific pool of questions, and even though not everyone may get the same questions, eventually some people may run into the same questions since it's all from 1 large pool of questions.

There was a thread about that a while ago, here, where the moderator said people were posting exact questions from NCLEX. So people can find ways to cheat on that too. It's just scary, since how will they cheat or cut corners during their profession?

Check out this thread:

https://allnurses.com/forums/f197/posting-questions-taken-directly-nclex-exam-113427.html?highlight=posting+questions+NCLEX

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Specializes in orthopaedics.

things like that burn my butt too. you can't worry about what they are doing. you can only do what is best for yourself. i know that the cheating is incredibly annoying and unprofessional, but unless your grades are suffering from it i would let it alone. how are these people going to do in the real world? on the nclex? all though it is easier said than done i would grin and bear it.;)

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Since you doing well, why worry about what others are doing? As long it is not affecting your performance, keep doing well.

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