The candidates receive papers with a series of absurd questions, such as "Why does crustacean social services have a separate department for barnacles?" and "What's the best flavour for nail varnish?". Each paper is slightly different in that it has a model answer to a different question. The usual kind of rules for cheating are in place and the exam is invigilated in the usual way, but the candidates have to answer the whole paper minus the question they've been given for free by cheating. Anyone found cheating is disqualified, but anyone who doesn't cheat gets zero marks.
-- nineteenthly, Jun 20 2010

Lifesmanship http://www.jewcy.co...thout_really_trying
[mouseposture, Jun 20 2010]

Who watches the Watchmen? http://www.nytimes....cation/11cheat.html
Under pressure teachers increasingly finding ways of 'boosting' the exam results of their pupils. [DrBob, Jun 22 2010]

Mystery of the high test scores http://thedailywtf....gh_Test_Scores.aspx
[Bad Jim, Oct 13 2010]

42

that cliche' aside, this is more of a game, but I don't understand the phrase "answer the whole paper minus the question they've been given for free" ... so there's no question, so what are we writing?
-- dentworth, Jun 20 2010


I think I understand how this is meant - let me try and give an example.

Let's say Ana, Bob, and Cathy are all taking the exam. They're all asked the same questions 1, 2, and 3. But in addition, Ana is also told the answer to question 1, Bob the answer to question 2, and Cathy the answer to question 3. If they all cheat perfectly - read each other's "free" answers without getting caught - they can all three answer all of their questions.

This is a little bit unfair - if your neighbors cheat well, your own score is likely to be higher.
-- jutta, Jun 20 2010


[jutta] Ah, that makes sense. I thought the optimal method of cheating would be to bribe someone, beforehand, for a copy of the model answers.

It would be "cleaner" if there *were* no model answers, and the "question given for free" was accomplished by simply declaring a priori, that Alice's answer to quesion 1 is correct, Bob's to question 2, and so on.

//This is a little bit unfair// Looked at differently "This encourages cooperation (or collusion)."
-- mouseposture, Jun 20 2010


[Ian_Tindale] //But you can change the marks afterwards, anyway, just like in the film “War Games”// ... or you can change the questions beforehand, which is how James Tiberius aced his finals.
-- mouseposture, Jun 20 2010


Why would crustacean social services be at all interested in molluscs?
-- AbsintheWithoutLeave, Jun 20 2010


[AbsintheWithoutLeave] That is the correct answer.
-- mouseposture, Jun 20 2010


... and anyone caught plagiarising from a very well known Internet Wiki-based encyclopedia will be summarily shot.
-- Jinbish, Jun 20 2010


I would judge cheating performance based on how well your answers matched your neighbor's answers. A strange game of 'telephone' if you will. All the students at the edges of the desk grid will be hired professionals with the original answers carefully laid out on their page. The teacher will be looking for signs of cheating and if you get caught you get disqualified
-- daseva, Jun 21 2010


Here's your free answer to question one:

Crustacean social services have a separate department for barnacles because unlike waterfleas, opossum shrimps and isopods, they have a neglectful parenting style, which should not, however, be assessed in the same way as the parenting styles of many other crustaceans, which ranges from the indulgent to the authoritative. It would be inappropriate for a barnacle nauplius to be parented indulgently or authoritatively as it would harm its personal development, whereas the reverse is true, for instance, of a juvenile waterflea.

Also, it's common practice for whistleblowing hermit crabs to make erroneous complaints to molluscan social services due to their common misconception that barnacles are in fact molluscs, so much of their caseload crosses over with that of the limpet department, which is not the case with, for example, decapods or cephalopods to the same extent.

See? I can talk bollocks for England!
-- nineteenthly, Jun 21 2010


Breathtaking. [+]
-- mouseposture, Jun 21 2010


I still don't get it - but I think that's because I don't have the context of how the exams are executed. Cheating is all about the context. So, how is the exam conducted? Where is it held? Is there more than one candidate in the exam-room (if indeed it is held in a room, and not in an underwater grotto) How many candidates are there? What is the distance between them? Are calculators allowed? What about books, ipads or other memory-aids? Is poison-gas considered cheating? We need to know the precise protocols of the exam (in order to know what is not allowed) in order to determine what might constitute cheating - a behaviour that in one exam might be perfectly reasonable, might be considered foul-play in another.
-- zen_tom, Jun 21 2010


What z_t said. For example, is not turning up for the exam at all but, instead, turning up to the examiner's house and holding a gun to their head whilst they award you top marks considered legitimate? Or, in the spirit of Oneupmanship, is ensuring the failure of your competitors just as good as, if not better than, completing the paper correctly?

Also, how are the invigilators going to know whether or not the candidates cheated as, by definition, anyone not disqualified for cheating was able to keep their method (if they had one and didn't just know the answers anyway) secret from the invigilator.

//This is a little bit unfair - if your neighbors cheat well, your own score is likely to be higher.//

Ah, but isn't relying on somebody else's efforts to ensure success and then claiming them as your own the very essence of cheating?
-- DrBob, Jun 21 2010


I would have all papers have the exact same question, but just as ridiculous. With such nonsensical questions, you would get completely random answers from the 'students'. If two students answers match up, then either someone cheated or it was just a very odd coincidence, and they both get the question right.
-- rascalraidex, Jun 21 2010


//due to their common misconception that barnacles are in fact molluscs//
Well, don't I feel thick? I'll get me coat.
-- AbsintheWithoutLeave, Jun 21 2010


[19thly] reading between the lines here, is there something you're trying to share with us?
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 13 2010


Sounds like a variation of The Prisoner's Dilemma. In this case the best cheaters win.
-- Boomershine, Oct 14 2010


[MB], well if there was i have either forgotten or it was subconscious.
-- nineteenthly, Oct 15 2010



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