Princeton Notebook — Commitment to Honor Code Tenets Shaky

According to a poll conducted by The Daily Princetonian on October 16, 60 percent of students would not report a close friend whom they saw cheat on an in-class exam. But about 62 percent would report someone they didn’t know well. The Prince administered a six-question survey to 2,002 students to find out how students would react to the two main tenets of the Honor Code: not cheating on in-class exams and reporting those who do cheat.

            About 7 percent of students polled said they had seen someone cheat but had not reported it. Two percent admitted to cheating. About 92 percent said they wouldn’t turn someone in if they only suspected, but weren’t sure, that the person had cheated. And 52 percent said they thought expulsion was an appropriate punishment for cheating. The poll’s margin of error was 1 percent. 

            According to the Honor Code’s constitution, a student found guilty by the Undergraduate Honor Committee of violating the Honor Code would be suspended for one, two, or three years. A second offense would result in expulsion. 

            The Prince conducted the poll because its editors suspected students may be unwilling to turn in Honor Code violators, said editor-in-chief Malena F. Salberg ’97. Last year, said Salberg, some students expressed reluctance to turning people in for cheating after reading in the Prince about arts editor Maria Burnett-Gaudiani ’98’s unpleasant experience as an accuser. An alleged cheater whom she reported was found guilty, appealed the verdict, and was granted a retrial by President Shapiro. During the retrial, Burnett-Gaudiani was questioned by an administrator acting as the accused student’s defense advocate who, she has said, made her feel as if she were on trial. (The student was acquitted.)

            Prince editors debated the purpose and relevance of the Honor Code in a recent issue of the newspaper. The editors’ opinions ranged from a call to implement a proctor system to catch violators to a belief that the Honor Code is working well, since 98 percent of those surveyed said they have never cheated on an exam. 

            Neysun A. Mahboubi ’97, the chairman of the Honor Committee, wasn’t concerned with most of the results of the poll, but only with the 60 percent of students who said they wouldn’t report a close friend.

            Next semester the committee plans to look at ways to make the Honor Code more influential in students’ lives. Ideas the committee will discuss include implementing a referendum every four years in which students would affirm the code, expanding the code’s jurisdiction to take-home exams, and adding more elected members to the committee. 

            Despite the need to tinker with the Honor Code from time to time, Mahboubi believes the code has “always been a good institution, but it is fragile.”

            Independent of the Prince’s poll, said Mahboubi, the committee is working to change some procedural flaws in the code’s constitution that became apparent after Burnett-Gaudiani’s experience last year. The committee will seek to exclude administrators and faculty members from acting as defense advocates, limiting that role to students. The committee will also seek to better define how the appeal process works and to clarify the role of the defense adviser. Mahboubi expects these changes to be made this semester. 

This was originally published in the December 11, 1996 issue of PAW.