I (20F) am a third year engineering student. I have always felt a bit behind compared to my classmates. I study consistently and my grades are above average, but many people in my course perform significantly better. My school is more focused on medical programs, and historically our engineering board exam passing rate is very low. That always confused me because many students seem capable, yet high performing classmates often fail the boards.
I am quiet and low key, mostly interacting with classmates through group work. I would not say I have close friends in the program, just people I work with regularly.
For a long time, I noticed my classmates talking vaguely about certain things in class and during group work. It always seemed like everyone knew what was being referenced except me. No one ever explained anything.
After finals last semester, a groupmate, Ella, asked me to go to the bathroom with her. While she was inside a stall, she left her phone unlocked on the sink. I know it was wrong, but I looked. What I found shocked me.
There was a group chat for our entire section. I was not included. I checked the list and I was the only one missing. I also found another group chat including nearly all third year engineering students, over eighty people. Both chats were being used to share exam answers.
When Ella came out and realized I had seen her phone, she was angry and asked me not to tell anyone. I stayed calm and told her I already knew about it and had chosen not to participate. She was skeptical, but accepted it. She confirmed the cheating had been happening since first year and that fourth year students were involved. Professors did not know.
I declined any invitation to join the chats. I did not want to cheat because even if it raised my grades, it would not help me pass the board exams or build my future.
This semester, my grades dropped. I performed poorly in my final exams, with my lowest grade at 2.8. A professor spoke to me about it, saying it was hard to justify my lower scores when almost everyone else did well. From their perspective, the exams seem easy because so many students score high. But those scores are not honest.
What really messes with me is how completely boggled I am that so many students across multiple years can participate in this without anyone questioning it or reporting it. I cannot wrap my head around how something this widespread exists without consequence.
If this continues, I might not even make it to fourth year not because I am incapable but because I am competing against people who have access to answers I refuse to use. I have not reported anyone. I am scared of being labeled a snitch, facing retaliation, or losing what little standing I have. Staying silent feels like I am sabotaging myself.
So now I am stuck, overwhelmed, and honestly disturbed.
AITA for choosing not to report the cheating, even though it is actively affecting my grades and future?
Yt dummy
This is your future. I get where you’re coming from and your reluctance but between being kicked out of the course or tattling, I think you should tattle.
YTA to yourself for not reporting it. I’m in nursing school & we can’t even have our phones on us during exams. Once someone got hers after finishing her test & everyone accused her of cheating bc not everyone had finished.. I’d report it if I were you
An engineer usually has a pretty important role.. report them
YTA for not reporting it. Not just for the sake of your grades, but because these people are training to become engineers. Their work will be important for the safety of everyone, and if they don’t understand the work they’re doing because they’ve cheated their way through a degree it potentially endangers lives in the future.
I was initially thinking OP is in a very difficult situation, but this is a very good point!
OP don’t listen to the dorks on Reddit, this happens all the time on all the majors. In engineering you learn the fundamentals but the rest you really learn through internship experiences and the jobs. Trust me when I say eng professors don’t care to teach half the time so they barely teach or tell everyone to learn everything from the book.
The people who cheated, the people who worked hard and had to repeat a class, and the people who worked hard and thrived all ended up at the same job. And most of the time there was no difference in the quality of the engineer.
Who in the hell leave their phone unlocked on the sink in a public bathroom. Why would you then snoop through an acquaintance’s phone for no particular reason while they’re on the toilet? This story sounds like a load of bullshit.
Why not write a letter explaining the cheating and mail it to the dean’s office with a random return address. Maybe they will change the questions to the exams.
why would you not say something. you’re ruining your own future for these people who don’t care about you.
My understanding is that you are reasonably certain that people are cheating. It’s not just sharing past papers and study notes. If this is the case you should start thinking of the long term implications as well. Consider changing schools.
Best Case senario – You pass your course and get a degree. For the rest of your career you have to hope that the cheating scandal remains uncover and the validity of your degree is not brought into question.
Worst case scenario – The cheating is uncovered during your studies and your whole department is discredited and any studies you have completed become worthless and you are unemployable in this field.
Also just a side note the engineering profession may have a code of conduct or ethical standards registered professionals are required to adhere to. Being associated with the scandal could ppssibly make you ineligible to register as a professional.
Lmao none of these scenarios would ever happen. Might come as a surprise but cheating has been happening since schools began.
While yes there are code of ethics and professional practice laws but if you graduate the a program then liability falls onto the engineer if something were to go wrong (eg. design fails and has said engineer name on it). After you graduate, you take responsibility on whatever you put your name on.
No one will take your degree away from you but if you’re a shitty engineer than you won’t ever get hired or you’ll struggle in this field for as long as you’re in it.
YTA. Report them. Your professors will be grateful, and your school may finally understand why its board exam pass rate is so low.