http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/26/education/stuyvesant-high-school-students-describe-rationale-for-cheating.html
As cheating becomes more widespread, more blame for the cheating has to be shared by systemic and cultural factors. That doesn't excuse the cheating, but it does mean if you want to fix it you have to look beyond simply punishing or controlling the cheaters. How do you reform a system so cheating serves little purpose and has little value? Is it a matter of replacing competition with collaboration? If you were able to make that replacement, would Steuyvesant and schools like it still attract the same students and produce students with similar outcomes, or would all that change?
As cheating becomes more widespread, more blame for the cheating has to be shared by systemic and cultural factors. That doesn't excuse the cheating, but it does mean if you want to fix it you have to look beyond simply punishing or controlling the cheaters. How do you reform a system so cheating serves little purpose and has little value? Is it a matter of replacing competition with collaboration? If you were able to make that replacement, would Steuyvesant and schools like it still attract the same students and produce students with similar outcomes, or would all that change?