How are old tests not cheating?

[Envix]

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I'd say 2/3 of my undergrad profs put up the last few years' worth of tests for us to use as practice, whereas 1/3 didn't. The ones that didn't were the lazier professors who really didn't care about the class enough to make enough exams to at least recycle every few years instead of every year x.x

Old tests aren't cheating (imho) because the professor knows that they are out there but still decides to use the exams over again. That argument probably wouldn't work very well in front of an ethics review board at your school, though.. it's probably a good thing that old tests were posted in virtually all my classes. Removed temptation.

And ya, you have to learn the basics eventually for the MCAT anyways.

 

[Gamechanger]

You know you could always just I dunno... learn the material and get an "A" yourself and stop worrying about what other people are doing.

 

[typicalindian]

really lol? at my school they GIVE students old exams anywhere from last years all the way to 4 years back depending on the prof. I've only had 2 classes where professors don't give out practice / old exams...

 

[bajoneswadup]

You know you could always just I dunno... learn the material and get an "A" yourself and stop worrying about what other people are doing.

1) I do make all A's and I do learn the material
2) That's why I'm whining on a website where I don't know anybody
3) I was simply asking what other people thought about the issue because I know it comes up a lot in many different schools. Why do you assume that because I brought this topic up I sit around and worry about it!? I personally think it's quite annoying for some students to have this advantage, but I don't sit around stressing about it, I just wanted to see other's opinions on the topic!

 

[Godric]

In my opinion its all fair. However it just sucks that it comes down to who you know and who you don't. I've seen profs in upper level bio classes say they will post the last years exam up for it to be fair to everyone because some students have friends that took the class and have exams to give them, while others dont. But I dont think you can consider it cheating because you simply arent cheating, you aren't copying another persons exam, stealing work that isnt yours, etc.

The profs that post old exams at my school make sure they twist the exam to the complete opposite of what it was like last year, so if you plainly memorize the exam your bound to preform poorly on the exam and mistake questions as repeats.

And not having any old exams or having any shouldnt affect your grade, in fact you should preform well without it. Because when you go take the MCATS its not as if having old MCATS will help you, xD and this is why we have standardized exams.

 

[Stumpyman]

Nevermind.

 

[Wolfman89]

Exactly. I know professors who post their exams, with similar "styles" of questions (e.g. calc exams with different numbers, etc). I also know professors who intentionally don't post their old tests, because they recycle the questions every few years or so. I think the latter gives an unfair advantage to students with access to the old exams (we're talking 4 or 5 semesters worth of old material), because up to 75% of the old material can be used on the new exam. If not everyone has access to such material, how is that not unfair?

That's how my orgo I and II professor does things.

 

[MiracleforMD]

People who think that standardized tests are not at least a MEDIOCORE to reliable measurement of intelligence are either kind of stupid or are bad at standardized tests. I'm going to quote George Carlin here and I could not find the actual quote, so if someone can, please help me out.

"I can't stand it when people claim they aren't good test takers. OH, so you mean when it's actually time to prove what you know, you don't do well??"

 

[paul411]

One of our course directors was saying how the LCME had certain rules regarding medical school exams that disallows releasing old tests/questions.

So this probably won't be a big deal once you get to med school.

 

[eli20]

One of our course directors was saying how the LCME had certain rules regarding medical school exams that disallows releasing old tests/questions.

So this probably won't be a big deal once you get to med school.

I'm not sure if it's LCME but it's definitely policy at quite a few places because of cheats. I personally prefer the old method of throwing the cheaters out of school rather than increasing regulations and treating everyone like a cheater. The only way you can see your exam here after taking it is if you failed. Not very progressive/useful imo but then you get to hear little gems of lines like "Examinations are not considered to be learning opportunities" and you realize medical schools are not run by people who know/care about education.

 

[45408]

One of our course directors was saying how the LCME had certain rules regarding medical school exams that disallows releasing old tests/questions.

So this probably won't be a big deal once you get to med school.

Not buying it. Our physiology class posted PDFs of the last five years of exams (including the cumulative finals) with the answer keys. I'm quite sure it was allowed.

 

[Morsetlis]

Not buying it. Our physiology class posted PDFs of the last five years of exams (including the cumulative finals) with the answer keys. I'm quite sure it was allowed.

My school explicitly sequesters all test questions and absolutely do NOT discuss them, not even for regrading purposes.

However, they professors easily provide twice that many practice questions / quizzes over the years, and the Anatomy director wrote a whole review book for sale on Amazon.

(We're also not LCME accredited lolol.)

I guess it's different at every school.