Cheating lecture sheds light on reasons for wrongdoing

By Richard Nieva

David Callahan quoted George Washington when he addressed a small crowd in a Daly Science lecture hall on Tuesday: "Few men have virtue enough to withstand the highest bidder."

Callahan, author of the acclaimed book, "The Cheating Culture: Why More Americans are Doing Wrong to Get Ahead," was referring to the temptation of cheating.

"(The book) shines a spotlight on some disturbing trends -- on greed and dishonesty, on cynicism and unfairness," said Callahan. "And on ways that even good people often do bad things to get ahead in life."

Callahan mentioned a number of forums in which cheating runs rampant, from corporate scandals to academic settings to Barry Bonds' steroid escapades.

Although he spoke about all of these avenues, what seemed to resonate the most -- given the speaker's audience and environment -- was the issue of cheating on college campuses.

"I think there are a lot of people who go through life thinking, 'I better not screw this up. If I take one wrong step -- get one blot on my permanent record -- I'll be left behind,' " Callahan said in his lecture.

One reason for cheating that he cited was an overall psychological source: fear.

He mentioned a rationalization that stems from a sense of hopelessness. Callahan said the obstacles seem stacked against college students: ever-rising tuition, coupled with struggling to handle jobs in order to pay tuition, all the while balancing extracurriculars they need to pad their resumés.

"It's true -- this isn't fair," he said. "America is competing with countries where college is virtually free."

Students then use this mindset to justify cutting corners, he said. Since the system isn't fair, he asked, from a student's perspective, "Why not level the playing field?"

Two-thirds to three-fourths of high school and college students admitted to cheating, according to Callahan.

"The epidemic of cheating in our universities is one of the greatest challenges facing higher education," Callahan said. "It thrives largely unchecked because universities have not made it a priority to stop cheating."

Inviting Callahan to the university was one step in taking initiative toward those priorities, said David DeCosse, director of the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, which helped host the event.

"We wanted to open up that discussion (of academic integrity) again, get it started again," said DeCosse, though he stressed that by no means is cheating a rampant problem at Santa Clara.

One audience member asked what could be done on campuses to curb the issue of cheating. Callahan, who spoke about people entering into a type of social contract so they could police themselves, said that schools with strong honor systems are most successful.

For example, a university in South Carolina uses a judicial system comprised entirely of students, including a student jury and appointed councils, Callahan said. These proved to be more effective because students felt more exposed when confronted by their peers as opposed to faculty, he added.

Another audience member asked about the moral values of Turnitin.com, an online plagiarism detection program required by many Santa Clara professors, and suggested that it's not ethically commendable not to cheat if one never has the choice to do so in the first place.

Though Callahan said he understood the audience member's point, he replied by saying the higher education system has no choice but to use Turnitin.com right now.

However, Callahan, whose articles have appeared in The New York Times, USA Today and the Wall Street Journal and is a frequent commentator on CNN and MSNBC, said that deep down, he remains an optimist.

"America is not in a period of moral decline writ large," he said, citing statistics showing the fall of crime rates, teen pregnancies and illicit drug use by teens. "In many ways, we are living in an era of moral renewal."

Contact Richard Nieva at (408) 554-4546 or rnieva@scu.edu.