Spring Break
Who's really cheating whom?
Michael Bertacchi
Issue date: 5/4/07 Section: Opinion
First it was baseball caps, then cell phones; now high schools around the country are banning iPods and other digital media players due to their ability to help cheaters. Unfortunately, amid the frantic dash to rip the last remaining joy a high school student has right out of his or her pubescent fingers, education officials have failed to realize they're dealing with a problem that began well before the iPod era: iDiots.
Cheating and/or cutting corners has been part of the American way for the last 20 or 30 years. Nobody likes to admit it, but it's the truth. From professional athletes' use of illegal supplements to achieve more impressive results quickly and easily to America's notorious political landscape, our country is, without a doubt, riddled with cheats, liars and farces. But cheating in high school? Dear Lord, what's this world coming to?
Banning digital media players like iPods will not solve the cheating epidemic. It won't even curb it. Why do I know this? Because there was this thing back when I was in high school called a CD player, and with about the same amount of effort required to make a podcast, you could easily record and burn a CD laced with cheats if you really wanted to. Believe it or not, if someone wanted to cheat prior to the iPod era, he or she could. Cheating was just as rampant 20 years ago as it is today, and the fact that the technology has changed doesn't mean the odds of cheating have spiked dramatically.
Teachers are also finding cheats interwoven in their students' iPod menus. Apparently, they aren't familiar with the capabilities of the $100 graphing calculators most of them require for their courses.
It shouldn't take a rocket scientist to realize this is the same old problem, just with a new, flashy coat of paint. The only reason this form of cheating is becoming an issue worthy of discussion happens to be because the iPod brand is sexy enough to whip small-minded people into a frenzy. After all, you never saw Texas Instruments in the news in this light, did you? Yet, Texas Instruments is just as guilty (if not more so) as Apple.
Cheating and/or cutting corners has been part of the American way for the last 20 or 30 years. Nobody likes to admit it, but it's the truth. From professional athletes' use of illegal supplements to achieve more impressive results quickly and easily to America's notorious political landscape, our country is, without a doubt, riddled with cheats, liars and farces. But cheating in high school? Dear Lord, what's this world coming to?
Banning digital media players like iPods will not solve the cheating epidemic. It won't even curb it. Why do I know this? Because there was this thing back when I was in high school called a CD player, and with about the same amount of effort required to make a podcast, you could easily record and burn a CD laced with cheats if you really wanted to. Believe it or not, if someone wanted to cheat prior to the iPod era, he or she could. Cheating was just as rampant 20 years ago as it is today, and the fact that the technology has changed doesn't mean the odds of cheating have spiked dramatically.
Teachers are also finding cheats interwoven in their students' iPod menus. Apparently, they aren't familiar with the capabilities of the $100 graphing calculators most of them require for their courses.
It shouldn't take a rocket scientist to realize this is the same old problem, just with a new, flashy coat of paint. The only reason this form of cheating is becoming an issue worthy of discussion happens to be because the iPod brand is sexy enough to whip small-minded people into a frenzy. After all, you never saw Texas Instruments in the news in this light, did you? Yet, Texas Instruments is just as guilty (if not more so) as Apple.
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