Cheating?

[quizbowllee]

I can't help but notice how often on this forum that people are accused of dishonesty (my euphemism for CHEATING). In the past few weeks we've seen it in a few threads (one in which I was the one being accused)...

I'm just wondering how many times a team has actually been caught (not just speculation or sour grapes, etc.) cheating. Does anyone have an instance where a team definitely cheated? How was the team caught? What happened? Was it a student, a coach, a parent, or a combination?

No one needs to name names, but I'm just curious. In the KMO thread, a specific act of cheating on the part of a student was discussed. I'm aware of two cases of cheating in Alabama. I won't name the schools involved, but will state that - as far as I know - no action was ever taken in either case.

I think that's probably the saddest thing... If a sports coach was caught cheating, then he/she would be fired. A student athlete would be removed from the team and probably given severe disciplinary action from the school, also. However, I've never seen any action taken against a quiz bowl coach or program that cheats.

I've made it explicitly clear to my team that if I ever even THINK that one of them has done something remotely dishonest, then they will be removed from my team AND I will push hard to have them suspended from school. However, based on things that I have seen, I feel that may be the exception and not the rule.

Anyway, just wondering if any of you had anecdotes/opinions to share on the matter.

[Byko]

I won't name teams in a public forum, but there was one instance in the southeast about 5-7 years ago in which a team from out of state entered a tournament, swept the competition to win it, and then later (I'm not sure if it was the day of the tournament or a day or two later, as I was not in attendance) came out and said that they had played on those same questions in a prior tournament.

Just for the record, the team described is not actively involved in quiz bowl at the present, and I don't believe their coach is actively coaching quiz bowl anymore. I may be wrong--if so, it's not on the level of being a state championship contender or a national competitor.

[Stained Diviner]

I know of one Frosh/Soph Tournament which had a senior participate. The TD overheard a suspicious conversation and followed up with a phone call to the school for verification. He told the team to return their trophy, which they did. I don't if there was any internal discipline. I think that the coach knew about it before it happened. He is no longer at the school, but I am pretty sure that the incident I described had nothing to do with his departure.

Additionally, I was present at the infamous Illinois Academic Decathlon State Championship in 1995. Steinmetz won the title by getting copies of the tests a month before the competition and having one of their alternates (a student) judge the speech competition. (They did not get a copy of the answer keys, but having the questions was a big enough advantage.) The awards ceremony was delayed for about two hours while the directors figured out what was going on. They eventually decided to give all the awards to Steinmetz even though their scores were outlandish. The appeals dragged on for a month and were complicated by the fact that many people on the state board were associated with Whitney Young. HBO made a movie about it--Cheaters.

[Stained Diviner]

On another note, I probably be locked for returning to the greatest team ever thread, but...

It is very hard to know the truth of the situation because of the number of lies and speculations, but here is one possibility...

The kid went to high school for three years, then entered a program at USC especially designed for students who did not get a high school degree but are ready for college. So, he is high school age and has no high school degree, but he is taking college courses full time and has full-time status at a college. If the USC program did not exist, he would be in high school. Theoretically, should such a student be allowed to play in a high school tournament? If so, should the USC program be allowed to form a team, or should students have to play either on their own or with their former schools?

(I'll let the moderators decide whether to banish this, keep it here, or form a new thread.)

[Captain Sinico]

Theoretically, should such a student be allowed to play in a high school tournament?

No. Almost certainly no. At any rate, such a person would be obliged to discuss the matter with the tournament host. It's fine to discuss this matter in this way, but no argument about the particulars will be tolerated (unless some new evidence comes to light, of course) for now.

To return to the strict topic, all the instances of cheating I've ever personally noted or suspected in my time playing (which, incidentally, have been few in number; perhaps 3 or 4) have been unverifiable. That's the thing about cheating; unless the people doing it are even stupider than the mean cheater, the only documentary evidence will be the very fact of their outlier scores. It seems like, in almost all the instances of people being caught "red handed," the evidence consists of either a confession by one or more of the participants or, very rarely, some piece of incriminating physical evidence that they were too foolish to dispose of.

MaS

[jonpin]

[Disclaimer: I was but a freshman when this happened, and may be mis-remembering some details.]
In fall 2003, there was a situation where the same NAQT packet was used at two tournaments (Oklahoma and I think Depauw) considered "far apart" by NAQT but not by Midwest teams. A team went to the second tournament, not realizing they would be hearing the same questions, but then played along for the day.

[hhssteve]

Well, GA (at least I'm pretty sure it ws GA) had a BIG stink when a certain unmentionable team recieved copies of tournement questions, brought them to the tournament, not knowing they were THE questions, and then used the questions BETWEEN ROUNDS. This may be the same incident Byko described (same time frame) but the team was expelled from the tournament and blackballed from the southeast. It's still kind of a joke between older programs to talk about it at random tournaments. I was not at the tourney, but I had a conversation once with a girl who was ON THE TEAM.
Interestingly (and unrelated to cheating), the Advanced Academy of Georgia, a post-secondary options program by West Georgia, has a team that plays on the Georgia circuit. I don't really see a problem with it.

[Howard]

I've made it explicitly clear to my team that if I ever even THINK that one of them has done something remotely dishonest, then they will be removed from my team AND I will push hard to have them suspended from school. However, based on things that I have seen, I feel that may be the exception and not the rule.

I think I've done a pretty good job of convincing my team that I'm rather omniscient. I'd have a hard time punishing someone without having the goods, but I think I'm enough in touch with my team to be able to find out what's going on. Actual cheating = gone.

[Stained Diviner]

On a positive note, there have been at least 100 coaches whom I have seen choose not to cheat. That is, they have been given the questions in advance (days, hours, or minutes in advance) and had the opportunity to share them with their team in a way that would go unnoticed. Consistently, coaches do not cheat.

[AKKOLADE]

Theoretically, should such a student be allowed to play in a high school tournament?

Citing http://naqt.com/high-school-eligibility.html

C. 2. A player establishes a student affiliation at an institution for a given competition year by enrolling in an academic term (typically the entire school year) the majority of whose days fall within that competition year.

C. 4. A squad consists of all players permitted to play on teams representing an eligible institution.

a. To be eligible to represent an institution, a player must have an affiliation at an eligible institution.

b. An eligible institution is any accredited primary, secondary school, or home school collective that has registered with NAQT. The squads of such institutions are high school squads (even if the school itself is not conventionally described as a high school).

C. 5. Students on high school squads may also have affiliations with post-secondary institutions according to
NAQT's College Eligibility Rules.

a. A student in such a situation may compete for both the high school squad and the college squad in the same competition year. In some cases, the use of the same questions in high school and collegiate tournaments may force such a player to forgo a tournament for which s/he is otherwise eligible.

b. A player in such a situation must notify NAQT 7 calendar days before s/he competes for the second squad.

Assuming the USC tournament used NAQT rules and that Reinstein and others' information is correct, then I feel it's fair to say the player in question competed illegally due to the fact that he was not associated with a non-collegiate institution at the same time as he was attending USC. Even in the general case, such students are in eligible if they're not explicitly associated with a non-post-secondary school.

What I don't know is the likelihood that he knowingly violated those rules. I'd like to believe that he thought that due to the program he was in, or his appparent lack of a high school diploma, he was still eligible. I don't believe that his stats were indicative of prior knowledge of the questions, although the lack of negs, as noted before, is odd.

Ignoring stuff like , have there been any cases or even decently supported accusations of cheating at national tournaments?

[Jeremy Gibbs Paradox]

Not to bump an old thread but this is my first real experience in qb with cheating

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/quizbowl/message/7584

It is also one of the stronger circumstantial cases of cheating I have ever seen. I'm not one to suggest blacklisting but I noticed that in Missouri and most other states when lawyers act in a way that is patently unethical, there name and offense is published in trade publications. Could we do a similar wall of shame for others (ie those who cut in paste verbatim from wikipedia, rip q's directly from the Archive, etc.?) Sometimes pillary does act as a deterrent. Unless you're

[Dan Boylan]

Wow, when you said "old thread", you weren't kidding. Anyway, I think the key lesson from the blast from the past linked above is that quizbowlers should not attempt to operate a "wall of shame" or "pillary" (sic) of any sort, lest they end up acting despicably and accusing each other without evidence.

[Jeremy Gibbs Paradox]

Wow, when you said "old thread", you weren't kidding. Anyway, I think the key lesson from the blast from the past linked above is that quizbowlers should not attempt to operate a "wall of shame" or "pillary" (sic) of any sort, lest they end up acting despicably and accusing each other without evidence.

It was the general consensus at the time that Cam in fact did cheat and likely was aided and abetted by his girlfriend who incidentally was the TD. There never was a smoking gun but there never really needs to be. Luckily for all involved this program/person was shamed out of qb existence.

My point is not just make baseless accusations. My point is something needs to be done about what seems to be declining ethical standards amongst people in general. Let's publicize who the jerks are who cut and paste q's entirely from the archive and who cut and paste whole sentences from wikipedia (or in the extreme case blatantly cheat) for the plagiarists/cheaters they are. And then, let's take accountability for how this stuff is allowed to happen. If you are the person compiling a packet for a packet sub tourney and send it to an editor on behalf of your team as representative of your team's work and someone proffers a plagiarized question as their own: suspend them from future participation in tournaments or with the club. I would even go so far as to endorse forbidding to register clubs that chronically refuse to gaurd against this. We are all on an honor system in this activity to a certain extent and there is no good reason for even the appearance of impropriety.

Sean

[Tegan]

About putting names up for pulic consideration: I warn against that:

A few weeks ago, I was at a tournament with my "A" and "B" team. We arrived to find we were not registered. They put us in for the host school's
"C" and "D" teams. I assumed that my "A" would go in for their "C", and my "B" for their "D". After another schedule change, I never caught that they had swiched my "A" and "B" team....which I didn't realize until they asked how my "B" team advanced, and my "A" team didn't. It was an "after the fact" switch. I felt bad, and I'm sure that some peolpe felt I was pulling a fast one. I was not. (My real "A" team finished fourth at the tournament).

The very next week, I am at another tournament, and triple check that my rosters. My "A" is in an "A" division, and my "B" team is in separate "B" division. Since they are facing appropriate level teams, both teams do great. The TD asks me if all is on the level, because she had heard a "rumor" that I was stacking teams. I got irate at that point! I made an honest mistake, one that I openly admitted to when I could have "faked" my way through it.....even offered to not take the trophy... and all of a sudden I'm the sneak who is stacking teams. I told her to look at the scoring....even though my "A" team was clearly facing tougher competition, they were scoring like gangbusters, while my "B" team was eaking out wins over pretty weak teams. She seemd to accept that, and (hopefully) all is well again!

I would take personal offense if someone called me on the carpet to this after I have explained the situation, and made offers to return the trophy, even forfeit the wins if necessary.

I have known coaches who have made honoest mistakes and admitted to them later. Its the folks who more than once try and get away with this that need to have their name passed among the TD to inform them of what is going on. I think that usually takes care of the problem.

[mlaird]

Having a blacklist does seem a bit like throwing the babies out with the bathwater. The potential for abuse would be overwhelming. I can see coaches taking great offence at one another, and this just going downhill quickly. In conclusion: No Names!

[Captain Sinico]

The problem with these concerns is that, while perhaps perfectly valid for high school, the situations motivating them don't occur in college, mainly because there aren't any coaches (with vanishingly few exceptions) nor silly rules and expectations on people. The few norms that there are (e.g. don't submit plagarized packets, don't intentionally register in the wrong division where applicable, don't register then not show-up, don't submit packets late or not at all without notifying the editors, don't cheat, don't be a total dick, etc.) should be enforced more stringently than they are now, because they're necessary for the circuit to be viable, are not onerous in any way, and are not very well enforced now.
Moreover, it is a normative fact that unresolvable issues are already made public, so something like a "black list" already exists. If a team, say, refused to pay for one of my events, I'd do everything I could to resolve that with them, but if that proved impossible, I'd let everyone else know about the issue, so they could avoid being bilked and (maybe) so the bilkers in question would pay-up. I'm sure almost everyone else would do the exact same.
Finally, tournaments in college are run by the teams for their own profit (apparently with rare exception, according to recent threads), so the incentive to abuse such a system really doesn't exist. For me to be willing to hurt my tournament's potential field (and, hence, my team's budget) by refusing someone entry, I would need strong verifiable evidence of something serious having happened; even just a straight accusation from someone I might otherwise trust wouldn't be sufficient. In other words, since it materially impacts my team to "black list" somebody, it wouldn't be in anyone's best interest to make frivalous accusations. As a somewhat less than hypothetical illustration of what I'm trying to say here, I'll note that there are some players and teams that other players and teams can't stand for various reasons; however, the latter are able to overcome those issues and not refuse the fomer entry to even their own tournaments, much less call for them to be banished from other peoples' tournaments. That seems pretty healthy to me.

MaS

[First Chairman]

There is a difficulty in enforcing or blacklisting people: there is no "judicial system" in quiz bowl. I don't want us to go towards documenting everyone on a team to the extent that College Bowl does (with transcripts or official documents for enrolled students), but there's a reason that we would want that type of verification. I hope I never have to request bonafide transcripts for every single tournament I organize or attend, but if any incident like this happens again, and especially at nationals, I think it would behoove those of us who run regional or national tournaments to consider requiring this sort of documentation. And adult supervision for high school teams.

We expect everyone to behave honorably without forcing us to assume everyone's tendencies to cheat first and ask questions later.

[username]

I'm aware of a case in the Southeast a few (3 or 4) years back where a hs team had attended a novice tournament, then played the same questions at a high school tournament a week or two later. Nothing was ever made of this, but people who knew the team were aware of the fact simply because of the obviously inflated scores and finish.

[Dan Boylan]

I guess this is basically a dead thread, but for the sake of completeness, I should probably disclose that I was a teammate and friend of Cam's at Claremont. The effect of his "internet trial" was not really to shame the team out of existence, but to just really piss off everyone on the team. The team went to other tournaments (not sure how many Cam made it to- it was our last semester, which was actually fairly busy, academically). I do remember that he didn't come with us to ACF regionals, and I couldn't blame him. Who wants to play for his good name, instead of for fun? Anyway, my point is that a "consensus" based on conjecture is still just conjecture, and that calling people out for suspected misdeeds over the internet, in my experience, does more harm than good. As for the other uses of a "blacklist", I do know that in at least one other college-based competitive team activity, a list of teams who owe money to the host is posted to a forum immediately after tournaments as a matter of course. I don't get the impression that it's taken as a condemnation so much as a simple reminder, though.