Accused of cheating by instructor

BabyLady, BSN, RN · Aug 18, 2009

Last week of first semester nursing school and have the highest grade in the class. already stressing about finals, etc. Then comes my Fundamentals teacher accusing my friend and I of cheating simply because we both go the same question incorrect. Mind you we had DIFFERENT answers!!! She also LIED to both of us stating that we did write the same answer. Nursing professionalism is stressed in the class she teaches, where is hers? I don't think that is called cheating but just making stupid mistakes on our part. She stated that she went to the nursing program director to discuss "what she should do". There is nothing to do. My question is what are the implications, if any, of an instructor falsely accusing you without any support to back it up and going to other instructors to tell them about it? I am a mature woman with a family, have worked my butt off to get where I am. I don't need some arrogant nursing instructor to ruin the rest of my year in school with a false accusation like that. It's jeopardizing my character and my integrity.
Thanks for any comments.
Beth

In my opinion, you need to seek advice of LEGAL counsel immediately.

This is a very, very serious thing and if they even find you unjustly guilty, even if they don't kick you out of the program, they can make the decision to put it on your transcript.

The fact that they will know you have sought legal advice, may stop the process before it gets any further, because she doesn't have enough evidence to make that kind of call.

Period.

noahsmama · Aug 18, 2009

I can understand you being upset but I think the first thing you should do is take a big, deep breath, and do your best to calm down, before you talk to anyone at your school about this.

Then, instead of assuming that the nursing instructor "lied" when she said you and your friend had the same wrong answer, give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she made a mistake.

When you feel calm enough to do so, ask the instructor for an appointment to discuss the issue. Explain to her that you're distressed that she believes that you cheated. Acknowledge that she doesn't know you well enough to know that you're an honest person who would never do such a thing, but that you hope this will become apparent to her as she gets to know you better. Then, point out that you and your friend chose different wrong answers, which shows that you couldn't have been copying from each other.

Ask for an appointment with the nursing program director too, and have the same conversation with her.

Then, the next time you and your friend take a test, do NOT sit anywhere near each other, since this will reduce the likelihood that the instructor will perceive you as cheating even if, god forbid, you do both happen to choose the same wrong answer to a question (which can happen by coincidence, of course).

The instructor was WAY out of line, but an angry confrontation will not help your situation, whereas a calm conversation might help.

Good luck!

Diaper, RN · Aug 18, 2009

Sometimes, I think it's so ridiculous of how some instructors constantly trying to kick the students out of the school. I know a community college admitted 40 students and there're only 20 left at the end of the semester. What's the point? It's such a waste of resources, money and energy.

Anyway, you should clarify it with the instructor. If he/she doesn't understand, go and talk the Dean or someone in the higher rank.

Good luck.

CandyGyrl1985 · Aug 18, 2009

oh i have been there.

i wrote a semester exam once on diabetes mellitus. it was 12 pages long - complete with pictures, bibliography and reference sheet.

my teacher said that because it was so well written, she felt that i had copy and pasted from the internet. she gave me a 94%. but i noticed that the girl who sat next to me- who was failing the class got a 100%. i asked if i could read her 2 page paper, and i found all kinds of grammatical errors, run-on sentences, and contradicting information - (that anyone who knows the symptoms of dm could easily spot.)

my teacher wrote on my paper in red ink "are these your words? because you cheated i will not give you a 100%"

well, i was madder than a wet cat in a bath-tub.... since i did not cheat, and cited every single source i used down to page numbers, exact web site addresses and correct in text paraphrases and quotes. i went to the head of nursing for the program and gave her my paper. she could not believe the teacher wrote that on there. she pulled up the internet in front of me and began typing in a few of my sentences randomly - to see if she would get a match. and sure enough she didnt. she then had me explain my references and i showed her what information i took from the cites and how i explained it and cited it in the paper.

in the end- she said this is a well written paper deserving a 100%. she then called in my teacher - who looked like she wanted to kill me. the teacher had to explain herself to the director and was reprimanded for not checking my paper before assuming it was a cheat.

teachers should quit assuming and unless they have proof they should not accuse. you know what they say

when you assume you make an a$$ out of you and me!

NurseKitten, MSN, RN · Aug 18, 2009

I agree with the potential for seeing legal advice. Unless she has proof, that's slander.

noahsmama · Aug 18, 2009

i wrote a semester exam once on diabetes mellitus. it was 12 pages long - complete with pictures, bibliography and reference sheet.

my teacher said that because it was so well written, she felt that i had copy and pasted from the internet. she gave me a 94%.

i had something similar happen back when i was in high school. i wrote a poem that the teacher thought was too good to have been written by a 9th grader, so she asked me if i had copied it from somewhere. this was about a million years before there was an internet, so no easy way she could look it up. thankfully, she was willing to believe me when i denied copying it, or at least grade me as though i hadn't copied, though i'm not sure if she was 100% convinced. i was rather offended that she would just assume that i couldn't write well, and that anything that was well-written must have been copied. and, i've gone back and have re-read the poem as an adult, and it sounds pretty darned childish (the word "saccharine" comes to mind).

oh well -- i honestly think these kinds of things say more about the instructor and their own insecurities than it does about the students, but this doesn't help much if you have an instructor grading you unfairly or accusing you of cheating because your performance is "too" good.

BabyLady, BSN, RN · Aug 18, 2009

I agree with the potential for seeing legal advice. Unless she has proof, that's slander.

Exactly...and if she is rattling her opinion off to other instructors at that school, the OP may not necessarily know about that, and it could adversely affect her later.

To be accused of cheating is like beign accused of being a witch back in Old Salem...all you had to be is accused, and your life was never the same.

Sometimes, you can never recover, just from the accusation alone.

Orca, ADN, ASN, RN · Aug 18, 2009

Speaking of instructors and cheating - my nursing school had an instructor who detested the idea of men in nursing. She was actually caught altering the test answers of a male student so that he would fail the examination. Even so, since she was tenured ultimately nothing happened to her, and there she was standing in front of the class for my final semester. I made very sure that I had as little contact with her as possible, and thankfully she wasn't my assigned clinical instructor.

pshs_2000 · Aug 18, 2009

Many schools/colleges/universities/etc. have written procedures to follow for cheating/plagiarism and for students to file grievances regarding grades received on assignments (or the final class grade). At all the schools I've gone to there has been an Honor Council that hear cases regarding violations. The professor and the student present their evidence separately, can call witnesses, etc. Afterwards, the council will deliberate and make a final decision (pending university apporval). At my first college, this process took 2-3 week, but at my 2nd school the process could take up until the student's graduation (2-3 years).

Maybe you can call the dean of students (over your entire college, not just the program you're in) and ask general questions about the process and how it is initiated. It may also be in your school handbook. I just found this link by google-ing "university student grievance": http://www.wku.edu/handbook/current/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=29&Itemid=26. If you school doesn't have such a process, maybe you can help get one in place so these types of situations can be alleviated in the future.

caliotter3 · Aug 18, 2009

Exactly...and if she is rattling her opinion off to other instructors at that school, the OP may not necessarily know about that, and it could adversely affect her later.
To be accused of cheating is like beign accused of being a witch back in Old Salem...all you had to be is accused, and your life was never the same.
Sometimes, you can never recover, just from the accusation alone.

I agree that this could be the beginning of the end of your nursing school career. Do not let this go. Take action of some sort to let them know that you can't be pushed around. Good luck.

pagandeva2000, LPN · Aug 18, 2009

I have seen things like this in school and this is one of the reasons I am so turned off from ever entering another college program. I remember I used to study really hard for my nursing exams, never earning less than a 90%. Then, after the exams were turned in, the professor would review the test. I would move on to studying something else and not even listen to the answers, because it should not mean a hill of beans since the exam can't be taken again (so I thought).

At least 5 times in my nursing program, the EXACT SAME exam would be given again the NEXT DAY, because so many of the students failed, but because they reviewed the exam, they would earn higher grades than I did. I was so furious because I KNOW those grades were not earned honestly. And, the shocker at the end of the day is that most of those same students continued in the same school in the RN program with some of the same instructors that allowed that crap. Many of them became RNs and some of them, you can tell that they are dumb as dirt. This is not a slash against RNs--this is just me saying that I saw some crap and these same people are now in higher positions that did not earn them.

You got great advice here, and hope that you can pursue it for your own integrity.