Honor Codes and Systems in the Educational Setting

Name:
Instructor:
Institution affiliation:
Date:
AP LANG ESSAY SYNTHESIS ESSAY
Introduction
Honor codes are important elements of achieving academic integrity, especially in this era where schools are offering expanded hybrid and online learning. Despite their importance, the establishment of honor codes in certain schools has not eliminated the culture of “since “everyone else is cheating, I also have to cheat to remain competitive.” In some scenarios, the lack to successfully maintain honor codes has been attributed to the lack of understanding of their objective among students and too much teacher involvement in their implementation. Using the readings of Vangelli, Dirmeyer and Cartwright, McCabe and Pavela, and cartoon, this paper examines how maintaining honor codes achieves academic integrity. The paper also examines how students’ understanding and peer culture within the school setting influences the maintenance of honor codes.
Regardless of the challenges that institutions face when implementing honor codes, they must be maintained because they create a culture of academic honesty. Cheating and academic dishonesty are issues that have become prevalent in learning institutions yet they are hard to detect. For instance, at Harvard, 125 students "improperly collaborated" on an exam in the spring and graduated before other students and the school’s management became aware of their dishonesty (Dirmeyer and Cartwright). Such scenarios have galvanized the need for schools to maintain functioning honor codes. Vangeli indicates that “implicit in an honor code is a belief in the integrity of human beings.” Therefore, other than preventing academic cheating, honor codes make students gain a sense of personal responsibility thus pushing them to become responsible and honest members of society. The importance of honor codes on the lives of students is significant and justifies the use of any means necessary to ensure their effectiveness. Among unconventional methods that can be used to maintain honor codes in schools include spycams, which research indicates that can greatly improve the implementation of honor codes (Cartoons). Since academic cheating has become prevalent in learning institutions, honor codes must be maintained because they create a culture of academic integrity that positively influences students.
Although the maintenance of honor systems is critical in achieving academic integrity, students should be allowed to formulate rules that govern the implementation of the system. When high school teachers implement the honor system as a set of rules, students tend “to view high school as simply an annoying obstacle on their way to college, a place where they learn little of value, and where teachers are unreasonable or unfair” (McCabe and Pavela). However, despite students perceiving honor systems as obstacles due to teachers&rsquo...