More International Students are being admitted to American Colleges

More International Students are being admitted to American Colleges

Tuesday, November 10, 2015

Research Blog #7--My Case

 SAT Cheating Case

It was an unusual day for those Chinese students who are going through their college application process in order to enroll in American universities in the upcoming spring semester, 2015. In the last week of October 2014, the College Board sent emails to all students living in China or Korea who had taken the SAT on October 11, informing them that their test scores would be reviewed and delayed for up to a month because of allegations of widespread cheating. It’s the latest in a long line of alleged and cheating scandals in the last few years in China that have involved not only the SATs, but nearly every other widely-administered standardized test, including Advance Placement tests, the ACTs, and English language qualifying exams.

Although the Educational Testing Service (ETS) claims that they have used every possible means to prevent SAT’s exam papers from leaking to the outside world before the tests begin, there appear cases when more people try to challenge the system. According to Ray Nicosia, the director of the Office of ETS, “We stop a lot but there’s always someone trying a new way. The advent of cell phones, tiny cameras and nearly undetectable recording devices, for example, has required his team to up their game”. Earlier in 2007, China Daily reported two students in China used wireless listening devices in their ear canals to cheat on an English exam; they were later hospitalized when the devices got stuck. But, those “technological tactics” are not as common as alleged cheating that involved large amount of Chinese students. In 2011, twenty students were arrested on Long Island, New York, for hiring other students—for a cool $3,600 bucks—to impersonate them in the SAT exam room.

According to one online survey conducted in China, more than 70% of the 160 high school seniors who participated in its survey admitted to cheating on tests. Furthermore, 90% of them claim more of their classmates cheat on tests in colleges. So, why is cheating so commonplace and arguably even acceptable to most Chinese students? The answer is tremendous competition and Chinese people’s admiration of “mian-zi” (the need to save face). Coming from a country with almost 1.36 billion people, one is expected to stand out of the crowd by aceing different kinds of exams, and the social risk of "getting away with it" far exceeds the risk of getting caught. In the case of Chinese students who pursue a degree in American universities, they are even more likely to cheat during exams because they tend to use one of the “Neutralizing Techniques” named “the Need of Responsibility” to justify their cheating behavior. Chinese students are more reluctant to communicate their difficulties, either academically or socially, with counselors and peers due to language difficulties and cultural differences, yet they still feel the responsibility to maintain their “mian-zi” by avoiding showing their weakness. While at the same time since American universities devote minimal resources to understand and help Chinese students adapt into American culture, Chinese students rarely have a smooth cultural transition process and desperately search for ways to retain their “mian-zi”. As a result, the phenomenon of alleged cheating during major exams becomes more prevalent and even acceptable to some people. Thus, if the cultural adaptation issues remain unsolved and that American public higher educational institutions are unable to focus on meeting international students, especially Chinese students’ needs, mass recruiting international students will further fuel China's test-cheating industry.

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