Cheating in nursing school

[direw0lf]

Myself and 4 other students saw cheating. It was reported to the dean, advisors, the director and the teacher was supposed to be notified. Nothing was done.

We take our exams online on our laptops and during the midterm two students had Google up searching for the answers. One also had her class power points up. These students received a 98 on their exams. It's really easy to look up and see this in front of you especially when you hear typing and not the clicking a multiple choice answer.

I wasnt actually the one who initially reported it but I did tell my advisor. What bothers me isn't that they even cheated exactly. Hard to explain but what bothers me is that the school was notified and no action taken. Like what is all this talk of integrity and doing the right things if the school doesn't uphold to that and allows cheating.

I understand one word against another and no proof too. Just I thought there'd be some acknowledgment to the class as a whole or change in test taking.

Not going to let this bother me much, I was just disappointed at the school ignoring it.

Do you see cheating in your nursing program?

[direw0lf, BSN]

Cheating is an indicator of integrity or lack thereof.

People who have no integrity in one area of their life, probably don't have it in most areas of their life. Nursing relies on the honesty of its nurses.

I could cite you examples of why honesty in nursing is vital, but you should already have figured that out if you're a nurse. If you're not, you'll learn. Or not, considering your response to the argument of why to report cheating.

I wish I could like this twice! We had a lesson about legal and ethics a couple weeks ago and read real life articles about making choices that lacked integrity and honesty including a nursing student who stole medicine to sell it on the street in order to pay for her college tuition. A little thing like thinking cheating is ok can allow you think worse is ok too because I don't think these students and nurses we read about all just went from honesty to mistreating their pts and stealing etc. in a day.

[Jacrazz]

You can cheat school but you can't cheat NCLEX so who cares

[sara567]

i reported about someone that cheated, admitted she cheated, and i personally saw cheat. i never saw her again, I'm not sure if that is because she dropped out or because the school dismissed her.

i would report anyone cheating, but after that, it's the school's responsibility to take care of, not yours.

[FolksBtrippin, BSN, RN]

OP, I have to agree that you really have no idea what the school is doing to investigate this, if they found evidence of cheating or not, how and if they will penalize the cheaters. It's their job to tell you the case is closed even if it isn't. Don't make any assumptions.

There is a group of students in one of my classes that takes the at home, online open book tests together. I declined their invitation to join without giving a reason. I did not tell on them. The final exam will not be at home and online and they will not be prepared for it.

[direw0lf, BSN]

This video was kind of point on about cheating:

An update: The teacher informed our class we'll be having changes for the next test and await instructions when we get to class. So even if I was told "case closed" I feel a lot better knowing they don't just dismiss cheating.

[cengstrom]

I had a generally small class (~30 students) and we had to take our exams on paper, have a cover sheet, and had to leave 2 chair spaces between you and another student. Our instructors literally sat and watched us like hawks, so it would be near impossible.

[Marmot24]

There will be people that cheat in every program, no matter what precautions are taken to avoid it. However, these students will not be able to cheat on the NCLEX, so if nothing happens to them now- just let the NCLEX deal with it.

[allsmilesDA]

I'm usually so busy with my own test that I have never noticed what goes on around me. On those few seconds I happen to look up during an exam, I have seen people cheating, or I thought they were cheating, but that is none of my business. I am more worried about myself and my test that I really don't care what others do, at the end of the day, everybody will be taking a proctored testing for the NCLEX, only the best will be awarded with the proper credentials. I am more of the mentality "not my monkeys, not my circus"

[NurseStelri]

When I was in nursing school I saw some of cheaters and it bothered me a lot. However now that I am a few years out and looking back I see that it really did catch up to them. None of them got kicked out (one was suspended for a year then picked up right where she left off) but most failed the NCLEX multiple times, complained of impatient/mean preceptors and/or ended up getting fired from their positions because of their lack of skills.

Just let things play out as they do because in the end you are paying for your education and they are paying for theirs. It is tough to see cheaters get higher grades than you but I feel that all of my positive experiences with preceptors and jobs are because of my solid knowledge & skills learned during school--I love learning. Those who cheated must not have and I would theorize that this carried over into clinical and made preceptors and coworkers dislike working with them.

[happyinmyheart]

Our nursing school has security/video cameras all around the room in order to specifically make sure nobody can cheat. You can't bring in anything but a pencil. No water bottle, cough drops, gum, hats, hoodies, ect. I can't imagine someone cheating. We also must be two sweats away from the people by you, and the instructors watch very carefully.

[tech1000]

We had people cheat in nursing school and they got kicked out of the program for good. No chance of reacceptance.

[Aceeey]

I saw lots of cheating in my program and had a lot of opportunities to cheat as well. As hard as school was and as tempted as I had gotten-- I never allowed myself to cheat. I failed a lot of my exams and ended up learning even more from those failures.