[mmcd]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Today we got this e-mail.


It saddens me to say that several students have ignored my warning on
collaboration on the final exam.

I do have names for individuals who committed this breach of my trust
and the Georgia Tech Honor Code.

I will therefor give you a choice:

You can respond to this e-mail and admit to me that you collaborated,
and I will dock your exam grade by 40 points (out of 110).

or

I will turn your names over to your respective Departments and the Dean
of Students and, given that you have this choice, do my best to see you
dismissed from Georgia Tech.

You have until Wednesday at 5 PM to choose.



[/ QUOTE ]

Translation:

I have heard a very reliable rumor that several students in the class have collaborated on the exam. I do not know (and certainly can not prove), however, exactly who those students are. I sincerely hope that one or more of them are stupid enough to respond to this e-mail so I can get to the bottom of the matter. Otherwise, I would be left without any recourse other than to either ignore the matter or readminister the exam to the entire class in a more controlled setting.


Sincerely,

Professor John Q. Jerkoff


All of you that purport to hold "honesty" and "integrety" in such high regard should be appaled at this letter. Other than maybe "I love you" or "The check's in the mail", "We already know you did it, and things will go much easier on you if you just fess up" is probably one of the most oft-repeated lies out there. That professor ought to be ashamed of himself for sending out such a blatantly deceptive e-mail in an attempt to punish dishonesty.

[/ QUOTE ]

Certainly possible, but the last time when the CS department pulled this "bluff" it ended with 100+ students being expelled.

[/ QUOTE ]

He's obviously trying to create a bastardized prisoner's dilema here. All it takes is one or two to come in and fess up, then they can get everybody. Maybe the first few to confess get a much lighter punishment, but the fact remains that if nobody says a thing, they got nothing other than rumor and innuendo. How could he possibly have a list of names(I am assuming that these people weren't stupid enough to work openly in the library or something)? I highly doubt someone in the group had a crisis of conscience and walked in to his office out of the blue and confessed. More than likely, some busybody overheard a couple of people talking about putting a group together and felt compelled to report it to the professor. As long as they weren't stupid enough to hand in 8 identical tests, if nobody who was actually present in the room says, [censored], nothing would ever come of this. The problem is, I guarantee you at least one of the people involved will cave and respond to that e-mail. This is why I said "no" to question 2 on the poll unless I had a close friend in the class. For those of you that answered "yes" to that question: Do you really trust that some random acquaintances from class would know how to properly handle themselves in this situation? I hope the group of kids involved had the commone sense to discreetly get everybody together to strategize/discuss the situation immediately after the e-mail went out. I also hope that whoever supplied this information to the professor gets what's coming to them.