Measures Curbing Academic Dishonesty among Students (Essay Sample)

ACADEMIC DISHONESTY
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Introduction
This paper is based on a case study of a nurse educator who discovered that one of her students plagiarized a final paper for a course. Plagiarism is one of the most observed forms of academic dishonesty. It is the practice of incorporating another person’s ideas without attributing or recognizing them properly. It involves taking of another’s writings and representing them as if they were your own. The past decade has marked an era of a rising trend of academic dishonesty. According to Ehrich, Howard, Mu & Bokosmaty, (2016), most students admit to at least try one instance of cheating in their academic work.
Perhaps, the incredibly high availability of information easily accessible on the internet and devices such as iPhones are the most contributing factor to the alarming trend of academic dishonesty. Also, extraordinary academic pressures on students may push them to believe that cheating is the only way they can achieve academic success. Academic dishonesty has detrimental consequences that call for proper strategies to mitigate it. As such, this paper will evaluate issues surrounding academic dishonesty such as the ethical principles and its consequences.
Ethical issues of plagiarism
Plagiarism is unethical and illegal because it is an act of stealing someone’s work and passing it off as if it were your own. Legally, the ethical principles involved with plagiarism are related to theft. When one gets accused of plagiarism he/she is simply being considered a thieve because they have committed an act of fraud (Traniello, & Bakker, 2016). Therefore, the ethics surrounding plagiarism are purely ethics of theft. It is unethical because it is a form of lying. Secondly, it robs the real owner of the work recognition that he/she deserves. Recognition can be in terms of fame, respect, and even money especially if the owner depended on that work as a form of their income. When derives income from work they do not originally own, they are simply stealing from the original creator. From the time a child is young and conscious of themselves, they are told not to steal because it is bad. In the rapidly growing millennial world, ethical principles have become increasingly relevant (Traniello, & Bakker, 2016). Maintaining primary ethical values in certain contexts requires one to not just accept the major moral values but also have the courage, commitment, and strong character that is not easily compromised.
From a bioethics standpoint, words such as morals and ethics have many imprecise meanings. Ethics and morals should not be restricted only to theoretical contexts. Ethical theory and moral philosophy are often applied when emphasizing philosophical thought concerning the nature and basis of morality.
Society perceptions of ethics are valid in any professional field especially for the healthcare sector, this is pure because medical evaluations and decisions directly affect the human lives involved. The Brazilian Ministry of Education, under the patronages of CNE/CES Resolution 4/2001, established national curricular provisions for undergraduate medical schools, which is used as the curricular for higher learning institutions in the state. One of the most outstanding ethical provisions highlighted in article three of that document is that the Undergraduate Course in Medicine should aim to develop medical professionals that are holistic, humanistic, skeptical, and thoughtful, who are qualified to practice medicine and act per ethical principles.
From an ethical perspective, it is critical to also highlight the reasons against cheating. Most social psychology studies reveal that some students cannot cheat even when they are placed in a situation where they could do so