A list of occurrences every student is likely to have seen on a test day: a fellow student peeking at another students test while the teachers back is turned, students “quietly” muttering questions to each other when they think no one is looking, students reading off of cheat sheets cleverly hidden in an “unnoticeable” location, and students frantically writing down answers to send to friends planning on taking the test at a later date.
One of the most known facts of any high school is that students cheat. It is something not exclusive to or excluded from Ramaz, but rather a fact that everyone knows but no one likes to talk about. It is an inevitability that year after year, students will find new ways to be able to do well without actually putting in the work. No matter how many new policies are put into place, or how many people are caught, students will always manage to find new ways to get away with cheating. It’s a tale as old as time and one that seems unavoidable.
This is not meant to advocate to stop trying to prevent cheating, as obviously it is a terrible thing that must be prohibited, just a statement of the unfortunate reality that students somehow will somehow always evolve to work past the system in place. When ChatGPT and AI prevention rules expanded, students found ways to get around them. When the new makeup policy system was instituted to avoid people getting answers from friends, new methods were produced. There is a constant search for an answer to this problem, yet no one has managed to find it and students not only schoolwide, but worldwide, continue to get away with cheating.
Yet just as known as the cheating itself is the unspoken rule that no student will actually speak of it. Whether out of fear of being considered a snitch, or loyalty to their cheating peers, when cheating at Ramaz is brought up, all students go silent. In the case of this article, all interviewee’s chose to remain anonymous as to not receive backlash from a mob of angry students mad that their cheating tactics were revealed to the world. One such student said, “Of course there’s cheating at Ramaz, you see it all the time. But no one wants to be that one kid who talks about it or reports on their friends. Everyone just keeps quiet and ignores it because what else are you going to do about it?” Another said “People cheat. Life is full of cheaters. But that doesn’t mean anyone wants to be the one to talk about it.” From students to teachers to the administration, cheating is known, but no matter what discussion about it is met with silence.
And if I’ve ever seen anyone cheat before, well, that’s one secret I’ll never tell.
