Is this cheating?

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So my friend gave me his exams from last year. And we believe the professor uses the same exams every year. I'm almost 100% positive of that. The professor gives us a practice test, but it's not at all like the real test.

Now, I have the real exams in hand now, Jazax to my dear friend. But is it cheating if I use them? Not during the test, but studying them at home... I mean, it *is* floating around. Though, most students probably don't have the same opportunity I had...

And if it affects your decision any, the class is CALCULUS. :skeleton:

And finally, if you were given the exams and in my situation, what would you do?
 
Yes, it is cheating. Seeing the exam beforehand is cheating.

If I was in your situation, I wouldn't use the exams to study from. I think you should have enough confidence in yourself to do well on the exams, brother. I took calculus and almost failed lol, but I went to extra study sessions until I understood that wicked subject:exhausted

The reason why I say I wouldn't use it is because when I was in high school, students did this. As a result I lost my full ride scholarship opportunity because they weren't playing by the rules. I lost out because of the wrong that they did. I understand that it happens in school, especially at the university level, but I think you should be the noble one and take the class the right way. Don't do what everyone else is doing.

It would bother me if I took a test and not be challenged by it because I already knew what was coming my way. I wouldn't be proud of myself at all.
 
i do not think it is cheating. If its not illegal to get past exam somehow, how does using the past exam = cheating? if your friend secretly got his exam questions out after writing his exam and is now giving them to you then yes thats cheating (I would argue that even this is not cheating as its his right to get his exam back and its his right to share that exam with anyone he wishes unless he initially agreed with the prof's condition that your friend will not take the exam out afterwards). but if its free knowledge then its not cheating. I am sure some other ppl in your class will ask their friends, who took the class last year, about what questions were on exam. Is that cheating? Cheating is when you seek help by illegal means DURING the exam or you get the ACTUAL exam that your prof made out somehow.
 
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Well the reason why I said it was cheating is because he said he was sure 100% that it was the same exam from last year.
 
Aprender said:
It would bother me if I took a test and not be challenged by it because I already knew what was coming my way. I wouldn't be proud of myself at all.
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That's my concern. I heard the final exam is hard though. But yeah, I can see where you're coming from. =/

mad_scientist said:
i do not think it is cheating. If its not illegal to get past exam somehow, how does using the past exam = cheating? if your friend secretly got his exam questions out after writing his exam and is now giving them to you then yes thats cheating. but if its free knowledge then its not cheating. I am sure some other ppl in your class will ask their friends, who took the class last year, about what questions were on exam. Is that cheating? Cheating is when you seek help by illegal means DURING the exam or you get the ACTUAL exam that your prof made out somehow.
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That's exactly what I was thinking! I do have a friend who sits behind me who said his friend gave him the exams.

Any other thoughts, anyone?
 
Aprender said:
Well the reason why I said it was cheating is because he said he was sure 100% that it was the same exam from last year.
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That does not matter. If he knows the exam is the same, then the prof knows that too. And if the prof knows that ppl can get last year exams yet he makes similar exams, then its prof's fault, not student's.
 
mad_scientist said:
That does not matter. If he knows the exam is the same, then the prof knows that too. And if the prof knows that ppl can get last year exams yet he makes similar exams, then its prof's fault, not student's.
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Agree. Students in my place use the past exams for study, and they got these from their teachers. But teachers here never give same exams every year.
 
Will your lack of calculus knowledge have the potential to kill someone in the future? (Engineering failures or something?) If so, then yes, it's cheating and you should study for real. If not, then knock yourself out.
 
It's not cheating. Past paper is past paper. You as a student should be revising from past papers. Therefore, you should revise from the past paper.

Go for it!
 
They are waay more strict about things like this in our schools. The exams are never exactly the same every year. They always change them, and make things more complex & confusing.

Do u think u are cheating ? Allah knows best I dont know.
 
I dont think thats cheating,just an oppurtunity :D Go for it.The Profeesor should know that students can use these exam papers as an idea.Its his responsibility to change it every year but if does'nt think its neccessary,than thats fine.But keep in mind he might change the question paper,may be he is testing students like that :p
If you have a simple option,go for it.Life itself bring tests for us,we dont need to jump in tests our self :statisfie




Live simply.Be happy :shade:
 
If it's a past paper then its fine I think. If someone stole the upcoming exam however then its not.

One time someone copied the physics exam from the teacher's computer to his USB stick, but I didnt use it and was proud of myself I didnt.
 
here we use our past papers for studying for exams.. commonly known as our "5 years"... they are available at shops.. and 80 to 90% paper is from that.. how can it be a cheating when nothing illegal done to find it..
 
No. You used the past exam to study the subject. Unless it's illegal to get past exams, it's not cheating. People do that for SATs and even MCATs.
 
I'd say don't study off it. Just try to improve your foundations of the class,revise all you can, ask your tutor (assuming you have one) for some review sheets and such.
 
Beardo said:
:sl:

So my friend gave me his exams from last year. And we believe the professor uses the same exams every year. I'm almost 100% positive of that. The professor gives us a practice test, but it's not at all like the real test.

Now, I have the real exams in hand now, Jazax to my dear friend. But is it cheating if I use them? Not during the test, but studying them at home... I mean, it *is* floating around. Though, most students probably don't have the same opportunity I had...

And if it affects your decision any, the class is CALCULUS. :skeleton:

And finally, if you were given the exams and in my situation, what would you do?
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If the professor uses the same exam each year, why does he allow students to take a copy of it?

How exactly did your friend obtain last year's exam? Did he just take it after he sat it? Surely all his classmates would have done the same?

Also, is this test the final exam or a mock exam? Because in the UK at least, final exams tend to be set by external examiners rather than by professors of the same institution.
 
Just food for thought. During the time I was doing a teaching fellowship. I would leave a copy of upcoming exams in my desk drawer-----with close but wrong answers.

The look of surprise after returning the graded papers was quite hilarious

The best and fully permissible method would be to find a previous year student who got a good grade and get him to tutor you.
 
Beardo said:
So my friend gave me his exams from last year. And we believe the professor uses the same exams every year. I'm almost 100% positive of that. The professor gives us a practice test, but it's not at all like the real test. Now, I have the real exams in hand now, Jazax to my dear friend. But is it cheating if I use them? Not during the test, but studying them at home... I mean, it *is* floating around. Though, most students probably don't have the same opportunity I had...
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So the exams is identical to last year's??
First off, what a lazy professor! They should have made new exams each year, even if they only change the numbers.
Second, not it's not cheating, because it's only last years exams, not this year exams even if you have a hunch it will be the same/similar. The fault is on your professor. Unless your university has very strict and official policy to prohibit distribution of past exams papers and make it illegal to study past exams papers, I cannot see how it is cheating.
When I was still a college student, in my uni, almost all if not all past years exams can be found in the library, which forced the better professors to be creative with new exams. It must been the official university policy.
I always thought it's the same way in every other unis and that it's a universal policy. But maybe only in Australia, although I'm sure some of my friends who studied in other countries also said the same thing about past exams papers.


Beardo said:
And if it affects your decision any, the class is CALCULUS.
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Calculus in the first year was indeed boring, until you get to the series (euler, taylor) and the multivariables.
 
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we study from past papers (both our univrsty nd othr univ papers)..infact, we hav to..thts hw v get the importnt questns tht almost always repeats..if the teacher knows it..he must be tryin to help (or is too lazy to make anothr qp)..so i dont thnk its wrong.
 

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