Texas Students Caught Cheating: Hundreds Affected At 'Exemplary' High School

Hundreds of high school seniors in Texas were caught cheating on their final exams last month. Now, officials at the southeast Houston Clear Creek Independent School District are investigating how around 200 students at Clear Lake High School acquired test answers before the exam in December.

Educators at Clear Lake realized that about a third of the exams had identical answers. As a result, administrators nulled all 600 tests, and offered the students two options: take the test again or have their final grade calculated without a final exam grade.

"We're committed to determine how the test was accessed, how it was distributed, what we can do as a school, as a school district, to ensure our internal processes to make sure that this doesn't happen again," Clear Creek ISD spokesperson Elaina Polson told KTRK.

The test was administered over several days. The test on the second day was a different version from the first, but school officials said some students gave answers that corresponded to questions on the test from the day before, KTRK reports.

In a letter to parents and students, Principal Debra Dixon wrote that students will receive an "incomplete" grade until they make a decision on whether to skip or retake the exam, Your Houston News reports. Clear Lake High School was rated "Exemplary" in 2009 and 2010.

Those who are found to have cheated on the exam may receive a zero, in compliance with the student code of conduct, according to KTRK. Disciplinary action against those caught will be determined following individual investigations.

Lisa Maxwell-Malik, the mother of a Clear Lake senior, told KPRC-TV that she wished administrators had told students of the testing re-administration earlier so they wouldn't have entered winter break with the pretense that they were done with the first semester subject, but the incident overall is still disturbing.

"That's pretty bad," Maxwell-Malik told KPRC-TV. "It's disappointing."

In November, the last of 20 students accused in an SAT cheating ring turned themselves in to New York authorities for accepting payments of between $500 and $3,600 to impersonate other students on college entrance exams.

The surrendered students are facing misdemeanor charges, and the scandal has prompted a review by a New York Senate subcommittee on higher education.

Comments

[kathy smelser]

04:10 PM on 01/07/2012

GOSH one would never think to put cheating and Texas in the same sentence........ that would be as bad as putting up a sign saying ...... welcome to heaven showing a picture of Texas

[bobbrowntown]

12:42 AM on 01/19/2012

Texas has been at the forefront of testing and for some reason the forefront of cheating, go figure. I was a student in Clear Creek ISD a while back and yes, there was cheating going on back then.

[MmeFlutterbye]

11:58 AM on 01/07/2012

Why should cheating by kids be such a surprise? Our politicians cheat. Our sports icons cheat. Our movie icons cheat. These are the examples kids see every day. And kids learn by the examples given to them by their heroes. Then they enhance the dubious qualities by doing.

[kathy smelser]

04:18 PM on 01/07/2012

by now i am sure that gov Rick P is going to say that the reason that this happened is because like him he does not like to read..... does not have time to study .....or to busy waiting for a vision while jogging in the park

[Torpedo54]

11:40 AM on 01/07/2012

Cheating is what texans do

[bump00000]

06:40 PM on 01/08/2012

All my cheating EX's live in TEXAS.

[tampajohn]

10:40 AM on 01/07/2012

This is news - especially in Texas ? ? ? ?

[bump00000]

06:41 PM on 01/08/2012

G.W. BUSH, cheater from Texas.

[Clevelandinwi]

10:34 AM on 01/07/2012

Cheating kids have a lot of role models today. Want me to name a few or a few hundred?

[BartStratton]

01:38 PM on 01/07/2012

The fish rots from the head down.

[Reality always bites]

10:25 AM on 01/07/2012

I was just going to copy and paste someone else's comment.
But realised that would probably be spotted.
So I had to think of one for myself.
Credit to the Clear Lake High School, for exposing the frailties of the students and being brave enough to risk condemnation.

[bump00000]

06:42 PM on 01/08/2012

I was just going to copy and paste someone else's comment.
But realised that would probably be spotted.

[Reality always bites]

08:14 AM on 01/09/2012

Caught out again- Even after complaining about your cheating exes!

[sactoken]

12:47 AM on 01/07/2012

The more laws there are, the more criminals there will be. End these high-stakes tests, decriminalize education.

[bump00000]

06:42 PM on 01/08/2012

Huh?

[sactoken]

11:46 PM on 01/08/2012

Lao Tzu

[murfiani39]

09:58 PM on 01/06/2012

rich kids cheating and poor school district teachers caught cheating .. seems to be a growing problem due to nclb and rttt. how about cutting out the tests save smoe trees and money, higher more teachers and teacher assistants . all this money is being diverted away from the classroom when will parents and the community wake up and realize that big business is the problem

[anitaroosevelt]

01:11 PM on 01/07/2012

Students who learn how to learn will develop critical thinking skills and will not be mindless drones marching in lockstep to the lies of the 0.01% providing the illusion of democracy.

Much better to teach them to pass standardized tests graded by Neil Bush's company.

[JenAshley]

09:50 PM on 01/06/2012

First off, I don't condone cheating.

That being said, I teach in the urban, inner city and few of my students cheat on tests. Let me rephrase that, few of my students bother to cheat on tests. Not because they are upstanding and would rather study and fail than cheat; few of my students cheat on tests because they just don't care about their grades. Misguided as it may seem, you have to have a certain drive and motivation to want to cheat - you have to care about your grades and want to succeed. Many of the kids I teach just don't care; as they tell me all the time, "they come to school because their parents don't trust them at home all day and don't want them running the street."

My co-workers and I are constantly frustrated by this attitude from our kids; it's a scary level of apathy. School, learning, education - none of it has any real value to them (or their parents/community). To me, this is one of the biggest problems with our failing public education system - education holds no value to many of our youth. How do you encourage someone - a child at that - to invest in something they deem useless?

[tampajohn]

10:48 AM on 01/07/2012

success driven linked as causation for cheating is more than "Misguided". A teacher's # one goal is to motivate students - not an easy thing to do - but dumping blame on students is a cop-out.

[tiptop3]

03:17 PM on 01/07/2012

and where are the parents as motivators in this?

[bump00000]

06:46 PM on 01/08/2012

Your honor he was just too lazy to cheat so I cheated for him. Humm, it just has an odd sound.

[Chipper1]

04:45 PM on 01/06/2012

Students cheating is a way of life in American high schools and you'll see their parents lined up and lawyered up to defend their little darlings. I've had the parents of senior English students look me right in the eye and say that their precious A students didn't know that copying a report from ECheat.com was wrong. Yeah, right!

[gallo48]

08:09 PM on 01/06/2012

Not only is it a way of life for students, but I fear that they take their cues from coroporate America. Let's open up the books of private companies and let them go under the microscope like public schools. Heck, if these corporations are doing the right thing by the books there should be any problems. Right? :-) Let's look to the banks for their stellar resume as a guide.

[4me2knw]

04:51 PM on 01/07/2012

I worked in prisons with violent people, who, some of them, had committed horrible crimes. Some were well into their 40's yet their mother's would call me and demand that I put their son ahead of everyone else or some other such nonsense demands. The staff when getting one of these calls would always say "It's a mother." and whoever had to take the call would groan. Still babying their "little darlings".

[tazmodious]

04:28 PM on 01/06/2012

The future 1%.

[bobbrowntown]

12:46 AM on 01/19/2012

I grew up in Clear Creek ISD. you have no idea how right you are.

[seanymph007]

02:10 PM on 01/06/2012

Not acceptable behavior...
But (since we are studying it) we must consider if these students simply attempting to exploit the natural principle called "Economy of Effort; the judicious exploitation of manpower, material, and time in relation to the achievement of objectives."

This "principle of least action" is a metaphysical principle that underlies all the laws of physics, mechanics, and evolution; it is the mechanism by which species developed and evolved (natural selection), a key principle in the laws of motion and equilibrium; a key principle in genetics and immunology; one of the 10 primary Principles of defense and warfare; and a key principle in business, economics, and conservation, etc... Consider the behaviour of light during refraction, and masse point, laws of movement and rest, and you will find that "conservation of effort" (which often equates to conservation of live force/life force) displays the working of wisdom in which the very universe was constructed!

[pneumerology]

03:10 PM on 01/06/2012

sure. indoctrinate them with a money dominated world view and then be shocked that they pursue it with such efficiency. guess they aren't so dumb after all. they are adapting to their environment.

[St Stephen]

01:37 PM on 01/06/2012

This is Texas Edumacation. Just above Alabama and Mississippi.

[Parade Keegan]

01:54 PM on 01/06/2012

Well any state that has School-boards "fighting" to teach biblical rhetoric as fact in an evolution (science, duh, duh, duh) class has already dumbed down their populace so cheating is probably SOP. I have to say, I'm in a position where I hire people and when I realize they've graduated from a University in Texas I look at them more closely as I doubt their education. Ya, it's bias. :/

[NordicChicMN]

01:11 PM on 01/06/2012

"60 Minutes" did a story just this past Sunday on all these wealthy kids who paid this guy thousands of dollars to take their SAT's for them. The guy said all these kids got the money from their parents. The kids used the high SAT scores to get themselves admitted to elite colleges like Harvard, Yale, etc. that they otherwise, had they not cheated, would've NEVER been admitted. NONE of these wealthy kids got in trouble &, in fact, they said that it was illegal to even notify Harvard, Yale, etc that these certain kids had fraudulent SAT scores & had never even taken the SAT! Nothing happened to any of them. They guy who took the test for all of them is the only one who got in trouble. So again, in America, white collar crime pays & it pays VERY, VERY WELL, providing one w/ a lifetime of unfair, unearned, non-merit based privelege.

[yemaya]

02:31 PM on 01/06/2012

but wait, aren't they the job creators of the future?

[anitaroosevelt]

01:13 PM on 01/07/2012

Exactly.

[rothomaha]

01:03 PM on 01/06/2012

So, let me get this right - the students who accepted the answers beforehand and then used them to cheat on the test are given a chance to RETAKE the exam????? Why are they not given a failing grade? If they had been caught looking at someone else's paper during the test, wouldn't that be cheating? Wouldn't that cause them to get a failing grade? Does a student have to commit murder in school before s/he receives a penalty these days? No wonder these kids know nothing and have no sense of propriety.

[nix28]

01:11 PM on 01/06/2012

I think the article said that the ones that were determined to have cheated will receive a 0 on the exam, per the school policy. The article is a bit confusing about that part; I thought they were giving cheaters the option to retake the test as well, but it would appear that those innocent of wrong doing will get the chance to retake the test, and the cheaters will not.

[rothomaha]

01:18 PM on 01/06/2012

In that case, I withdraw my acerbic comment. Hopefully, you are correct and the zero will stand, no matter the parents' bitc.ing and moaning!

[BartStratton]

01:42 PM on 01/07/2012

The kid who studied hard, aced the exam and then smoked a joint afterward to celebrate would be expelled and denied Federal student loans. That's what 30 years of conservative propaganda has done for this country - Texas is the vanguard for a failed culture charging into the dark ages.