0910AW 同主题写作第三期 ARGUMENT242 by nlhust

nlhustUID：2404239

TOPIC: ARGUMENT242 - The following appeared as an editorial in the student newspaper of Groveton College.

"To combat the recently reported dramatic rise in cheating among college and university students, these institutions should adopt honor codes similar to Groveton's, which calls for students to agree not to cheat in their academic endeavors and to notify a faculty member if they suspect that others have cheated. Groveton's honor code replaced an old-fashioned system in which students were closely monitored by teachers and an average of thirty cases of cheating per year were reported. The honor code has proven far more successful: in the first year it was in place, students reported twenty-one cases of cheating; five years later, this figure had dropped to fourteen. Moreover, in a recent survey conducted by the Groveton honor council, a majority of students said that they would be less likely to cheat with an honor code in place than without."
WORDS: 647   

To tackle with the problem of increasing cheating cases among college and university students, the author of the editorial suggests adopting a new supervisory system called honor codes. A similar system had been established in GC. The author shows us the lessening of cheating cases in GC in recent years in and attributes it to the use of honor codes. Also, a survey is offered to demonstrate that the GC's students regard honor codes as an efficient way to prevent themselves cheating. With these, the author claims that honor codes will also work in other institutions. However, when scrutinizing the given information and the author's reasoning, I find several serious weakness.

First of all, less cases of cheating may not result from the adoption of honor code in GC. A only fact that the figure of cheating cases dropped after GC had changed the old system to honor code just indicates that the new system might have worked, but a lot of other factors could also lead to the same consequence. Maybe the government punishes those cheated in academic endeavors much more severe in these two years, in which way those students not only earn a bad reputations but also lose the opportunity to do further research in the academic field. Seeing the serious results of cheating, most of the students of GC probably dare not to cheated any more, and this could be a possible answer to the decline of the figure. Also, a series of education program may be offered to all the GC's students to ensure that they know cheat would ruin their own life and even seriously harm the society. Being fully aware of these, the GC's students might cheat less and thus the number of cheating cases dropped. In order to convincing us, the author should account for all the other possible factors, such as the two mentioned above, that may cause the dropped figure.

Even if the honor code really succeeded in GC, it might be useless in other colleges and universities. Each of this institutions has its unique features, which could result in different outcomes with the honor code.  Such features vary from the conscientiousness of teachers and the quality of students. If the teachers of GC are less conscientious compared with those of the other colleges and universities, the new supervisory system are more likely useless  in those other institutions. Because the GC's teachers might little attention to the students and seldom warn their students against cheating, which could causes the high cheating figure. Therefore, when the system changed, students might be aware of the serious harm of cheating and then change their behavior. If this is the case, in the institutions where teachers have already supervised their students a lot, honor code will not act as successfully as it worked in GC. Also, if the GC's students are more active and more willing to supervise others, It is possible that the students in other colleges and universities might not take their responsibility of supervisory well so that the condition of cheating will not change in these institutions even with the honor code.


A same false analogy occurred when the author try to use the survey to prove the universal effectiveness of the honor code. The majority of GC's students said like that in the survey may because they are more self-discipline and care more about their fames among the peers. But situation may be different in other institutions so that the GC's students' answer to the survey could not indicate that students of other institution will feel the same.

In a nutshell, the author's analysis is less convincing because of ignoring some other factors that may affect the figure of cheating. To avoid this kind of mistake, the author should think everything carefully and offer the essential extra information before he or she makes the final judgment.