Cheating... the first kind.

I would prefer even to fail with honor than win by cheating. 

-Sophocles  

      On Thursday, December 20th, after a long day of finals, I visited my AP Psychology teacher, Mrs. Roberts, to give her a Christmas card that I made. Placing it on her desk, I turned around and was about to leave when she called me over. She had a grave look on her face and said, "Kristina, someone cheated off your test." I was so shocked that someone would do that since I never leave my answers out in the open. Obviously the cheater had exceptional vision if he was able to see my answers, in my opinion. I shook my head in disbelief, saying that I had no idea that this was happening. She gave me the benefit of the doubt, which made me feel terrible inside since I felt that she didn't trust me. Yet I understood that as a teacher, she should make her decision without bias. She admonished me for not being careful because in college, the professor won't care who cheated and who didn't. If your answers were the same as someone else's, voila, here's a 0%. I was about to leave when it hit me: why would someone cheat off of me if each row got a different test, and the person behind me couldn't see my answers? She was nodding at me as I asked her that because the person who cheated didn't know we had different tests, and honestly, after that moment, I felt sorry for that person. I didn't pity them for getting caught; I pitied them for their stupidity. Yes, it can be rude to say that, but they were stupid to even think about cheating. From the very beginning, I've put blood, sweat, and tears into studying and doing my best in all my classes, and that cheater believed he could get away with his laziness. So, moral of the story is, no matter how you cheat, you're going to get caught. Whether it's your teacher, boss, friend, or even your conscious that might get to you, the consequences of lying and cheating are agonizing. It's not worth it. The lesson I learned from this situation was to be careful and not so naïve. I honestly trusted all these students, and I thought that all of them knew that the tests were different. Obviously, some of us aren't the brightest crayons in the box. And at that moment, I was one of those dull-colored crayons for not being careful. Thankfully, no bad consequences were seen in this situation, but I'm glad this happened during high school and not in college, where my entire career could be jeopardized.

P.S. Karma has a good sense of humor. ;)