Are we becoming a nation of cheats?

Date June 12, 2015

Smith

THE AGE

Anna Patty, Eryk Bagshaw and Alexandra

Tailor-made assignments, worth between $125 and $300 a piece are often
handed in verbatim or rote learned and regurgitated in exams.
Tailor-made assignments, worth between $125 and $300 a piece are often
handed in verbatim or rote learned and regurgitated in exams.
Nursing students putting patients at risk through cheating
Babis Lagos was apparently as mystified as anyone. Under questioning, the
community college worker simply could not explain how a Certificate IV in
Horticulture featured on his curriculum vitae.
He said he had no idea how it got there.
Former Australian Bureau of Statistics employee Christopher Hill was jailed for
his part in what a judge described as Australia's worst ever case of insider
trading.
Former Australian Bureau of Statistics employee Christopher Hill was jailed for
his part in what a judge described as Australia's worst ever case of insider
trading. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
A week after telling his employer the CV then disappeared from his personnel
file. A new one was found in its place.
This case of a doctored CV, played out in the Fair Work Commission, contributed
to Lagos's dismissal but its importance stretches well beyond his red-faced
Gippsland college.
More and more the fundamental pillars of our professional DNA from high
school exams and university papers to our CVs and ongoing development
requirements appear malleable, transactional, sometimes even fictional.
As many as one in 15 of the CVs that come to Gary Gill, a forensic expert at
KPMG, for checking on behalf of clients contain false information ranging from
excessive embellishment to dishonest claims of university degrees. He points to
the internet age as a contributor.
"I think what we are finding is there is so much information available online these
days that it is pretty easy to do these checks. By the same token, because
everything is so available online, you can buy a fake degree. There is probably
more of it happening as well," he says.
Mr Gill says a surprising number of businesses did not take the trouble to verify
qualifications of prospective employees.
Tony Shepherd says Australians tend to push limits.

Some companies have sacked workers for dishonesty even when it is only
discovered many years after their recruitment.
"Employers are concerned about employees or potential employees being honest
and open about their qualifications, their prior work experience," says Sonia
Millen, a partner at Herbert Smith and Freehills an adviser to companies on
employment.
"Some organisations have taken a view that there is dishonesty and that
dishonesty is such that it warrants termination of employment even if it has
been uncovered years later."
As many as one in 15 of the CVs that KPMG's Gary Gill examines contains false
information.
As many as one in 15 of the CVs that KPMG's Gary Gill examines contains false
information. Photo: Michele Mossop
Tony Shepherd is a top businessman. As Transfield chairman, former Business
Council of Australia president and head of the Abbott government's commission
of audit sees that pushing limits could be seen as a feature of our national
identity.

"I wouldn't say it is an endemic problem. It would be one per cent at most. There
will always be cheaters in our society. There is a trend in Australia that if you can
get away with it, you do it."
He says his own business routinely checks the validity of CVs, particularly for
senior positions.
A cheating scandal in the faculty of medicine has rocked Australia's oldest
university.
A cheating scandal in the faculty of medicine has rocked Australia's oldest
university. Photo: Nic Walker
"Every now and then you catch one who has exaggerated," he says.
It is crucial that cheating is stamped out in all its forms whether it be in the
finance, education or sporting sector, he says.
"We have to maintain high standards and we have to enforce those standards.
The fundamental of education is to produce good productive citizens and when I
say good citizens, I mean honest. This win-at-all-cost attitude is not healthy."
Schooling cheats?

Today's students are tomorrow's workforce and the catalysts that drive cheating
are present from the earliest stages of school, according to education academics,
and stress is one of them.
"For students and parents it's the drive for competitive advantage, anything that
will give them the edge. That edge has become focused on killer strategies,"
says Professor Richard Teese, an expert in education policy from the University of
Melbourne.
Tutoring, marks, the pressure to succeed all build throughout primary school as
parents push their children as young as eight towards the selective tests.
"I can't tell you how stressed these children are," says a mother at a Sydney
selective school.
"As a parent, when you see this happening around you, and you know that 0.01
of a mark can make the difference between getting an opportunity and missing
out on one, the self-doubt can be extraordinary if you are under this kind of
pressure all your life you can see how the cheating happens."
Those savvy enough to jump the hurdle at 12 and many of those straggling
behind, still have years of expectation upon their shoulders as they build up to
the HSC.
Six years on in their high school career, students see the ATAR as the defining
mark of their lives, and according to teachers, so do many parents.
Here the cheating market thrives.
As Fairfax Media has revealed recently, NSW high school students are paying
hundreds of dollars to have assignments written for them by private companies
and individual tutors as teachers struggle to contain a cheating culture they have
described as "endemic".
Companies from Melbourne to Newtown to Cabramatta are going on hiring
sprees, all unscrupulously taking advantage of a vibrant cash-for-essays industry.
The tailor-made assignments, worth between $125 and $300 a piece are often
handed in verbatim or rote learned and regurgitated in exams, where according
to the Board of Studies malpractice register other students were going to the
extent of stuffing microphones into their shirts, notes into their underpants and
smuggling smartphones into exam rooms.
As in much of the tertiary sector, parts of the culture has become accepted, the
great unspoken truth of education pressure, according to education researcher
and former principal Chris Bonnor.
At Sydney Technology High in Hurstville it is one reason that four senior
members of its English faculty are resigning at the end of this year.

"Teachers are unable to confront students who write bespoke essays," says a
teacher at the school.
At the state's top schools of James Ruse High and Normanhurst Boys, it is
understood that eight students were confronted by the principal after they each
wrote identical paragraphs in an exam, while a free market of digital essays flows
between the schools.
"We can't trust what our students are bringing in," acknowledges the president of
the NSW teachers federation, Maurie Mulheron.
If they can't trust what they are bringing in high school, then the trust deficit has
bottomed out at university level.
As revealed in November, every major NSW university was implicated when
thousands of students enlisted Sydney company MyMaster to write essays and
assignments for them as well as sit online tests, paying up to $1000 for the
service.

All subjects from business to design to law were covered in a sophisticated

operation that netted its owner, former Pittwater House and Macquarie
University student Yingying Dou over $160,000 in revenue in 2014 aloneNow the
medical profession has been implicated too. At least 70 medical students at the
University of Sydney fabricated patients, falsified records and even relied on
"interviews" with dead patients in an academic dishonesty scandal to rock the
respected medical school.The students,who are now in the final year of their
medical degree, were given the chance to "reflect" on their actions and do
another task if they admitted their academic dishonesty.
The university also revealed that three of those under investigation for
misconduct graduated last year. It is not known if they are practising in hospitals.
Several students contacted Fairfax to criticise the program of study involved,
describing it as "useless" and "meaningless" and claimed students had made
mistakes but were not cheats.
But other students said there was an "entitlement" culture in the medical school.
"What I found to be extremely disturbing was the attitude of my colleagues who
got caught. They weren't angry or sorry about what they did, they were angry
they got caught," one student wrote.
"They were angry because they felt that the assignment was not relevant to their
teaching it was beneath them compared to what they believed should be
taught in medicine and so they thought it was okay to bend the rules."
When it comes to training future doctors, Merrilyn Walton, a former head of
professional development at the University of Sydney's medical school, says it

took its ultimate obligation to patients very seriously. The recent lapse in
standards is unusual, but worrying, she says.
"The doctor patient relationship is based on trust," she says. "That means you
need to be honest and aware of your conflicting interests, because it is society
that puts doctors in a very privileged place."
The protection of future clients is also front of mind for the legal profession,
which takes academic misconduct seriously.
Admission to the profession requires that a person be considered to be 'fit and
proper', which includes being honest.
"[I]t is important for the protection of clients and stakeholders in the system that
lawyers be people of honesty and integrity," Sydney barrister Scott Maybury
said.
"A willingness to be dishonest in the achievement of professional status does not
speak well of a person's possible conduct when placed under pressure as a
lawyer.
"Every case will be considered on its own merits, but there are a number of
instances where academic misconduct has caused delay, or even denial, in a law
graduate's admission to practice"
But the pressure to succeed is too much for some students who cut corners.
Business concern
Certainly some in the broader business community are concerned that easy
access to online content, including cheat materials, had tempted students to
game the system.
"The pressure to succeed can force some people to do things that are
unacceptable," says Kate Carnell, chief executive officer for the Australian
Chamber of Commerce.
"The challenges for students particularly to get a job now means it's not just
about passing, it's about doing really well. From the employer perspective, it
really does mean you have to check CVs not just what you are given, but to
make some other checks."
Companies are now shifting their focus from the bottom line to developing values
and ethics. The "greed is good" ethic has given way to corporate social
responsibility.
"The businesses that are succeeding are seeing that paying more isn't the way to
keep the best and brightest. Having a values driven organisation is. And values
driven organisations make more profit."

Jenny Lambert, the director of employment, education and training at ACCI, says
she has no doubt the internet has made it easier to cheat whether it be at
university or to enter the workplace.
"These things are much easier than they used to be so it actually requires much
more vigilance than perhaps would have been the case in the past," she said.
"Business ethics has become a core requirement within management diplomas
and degrees.
"Companies are constantly scrutinised through the media and social media to
perform to community expectations and it is exceptionally important that the
employees within that company bring a very strong ethical and moral compass."
Innes Willox, who heads another of Australia's largest business associations, the
Australian Industry Group, says some of the wrongdoing is innocence of the
rules.
"Facebook generation candidates see the difference between selling themselves
and fabricating skills and experience as being more of a grey area than the black
and white of previous generations," he said.
"The tight labour market also throws up more of this type of behaviour as
candidates under pressure for a diminishing number of jobs look for any edge
they can get. Which is a very risky business.
"Employers are awake to this and putting more effort into due diligence with new
recruits as they should".
Peter Wilson, chairman of the Australian Human Resources Institute, says that is
already happening.
"They are spending more time rigorously searching out somebody and not just
relying on what they put up on their CV, or their Linked In site," he says.
"But every now and then someone gets through the net.
"It's not a flood, but there are some. There is also increased capacity to trap
them if they do it."
Mr Wilson says there was a risk that students with a history of academic cheating
may try to cheat in the workplace.
Culture focus
This kind of behaviour feeds into broader concerns about culture that have
prompted action from eky regulators: the Australian Securities and Investments
Commission (ASIC) and Australian Prudential Regulation Authority.
ASIC has teamed up with Sydney ethicist Simon Longstaff from the St James
Ethics Centre to develop an ethical literacy program for financial advisers, their
managers and executives.

The initiative follows revelations about the financial planning scandal involving
Australia's major banks whose sales-driven financial planning arms charged
clients for advice they never received and cheating on professional exams (most
notoriously Macquarie Group's so-called Penske File arrangement where planners
circulated answers to tests)
Culture was also fingered in the an insider trading scandal worth $7 million
involving former NAB banker Lukas Kamay and an Australian Bureau of Statistics
worker.
Fiat Chrysler has also found itself in controversy after Fairfax Media revealed
hundreds of thousands of dollars in corporate funds were spent on luxury items
including a yacht and home renovations for executives.
"[Some organisations] come to ethics because of a deficit. But some are just
thinking it is better to organise their organisations on ethical frameworks, he
says.
"Even in the last 15 months there is a change taking place in Australia where
instead of relying predominantly on regulation and surveillance, this is now being
rebalanced by an equal understanding in the importance of ethics in establishing
the core foundations for institutions and organisations and various practices."
Mr Longstaff says APRA and ASIC have "in a quite breathtaking way" been
leading the movement away "from compliance, towards culture change".
ASIC chairman Greg Medcraft, told a Senate Estimates Committee hearing last
week that ASIC is "concerned about culture because it is a big driver of conduct
in the financial industry".
"It is a sad fact that bad culture leads to bad conduct and this inevitably leads to
poor outcomes for consumers," he said.
"[W]hen I talk about poor outcomes for customers, this is a polite way of saying
people are getting fleeced.
"And sadly those who get fleeced are usually not necessarily the country's
wealthy, but everyday Australians, who might have no more than their house
and their super and perhaps a nest egg."
Mr Medcraft says ASIC is planning to target poor practices that may increase the
potential for poor conduct, "and therefore increase the risk to investor and
consumer trust and confidence".
"We think that when an officer breaches a law ASIC administers and culture is
responsible then the officers and the firm should be responsible," he said.
"We think the officer and the firm should be subject to civil penalties and
administrative sanctions as accessories."

Daniel Musson, the chief executive officer, Australian Institute of Management,

has also approached the St James Ethics Centre to help develop a new ethical
framework for his members.
"We are now looking at what education and training options can be delivered to
help managers and leaders practice their ethical decision-making."