18 midshipmen exit U.S. Naval Academy following cheating scandal

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Source: NBC News

Eighteen midshipmen have been expelled or resigned from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., after an investigation concluded they cheated on a remote physics exam in December 2020, according to school officials.

On that month, 653 midshipmen took the final exam for General Physics I through the online platform myopenmath.com in order to limit in-person contact during the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a statement from the academy released Friday.

Officials said students, who were mostly sophomores, were given written and verbal instructions prohibiting them from using any "outside sources to complete the exam, including other websites."

Vice Adm. Sean Buck, the academy’s superintendent, requested an investigation after learning that many midshipmen may have used outside sources during the test. Some of the allegations came to light in an anonymous chat platform students used to discuss the exam after taking it, according to the academy.

Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/18-midshipmen-exit-us-naval-academy-following-cheating-scandal/ar-AANzH3j?li=BBnb7Kz

[Kittycatkat]

1. best and brightest...

[Champp]

2. Republican recruiters will be all over them

These are their kinds of folks.

[Kittycatkat]

6. their peeps for sure

[harumph]

3. Counterintuitively, I believe the best and brightest to be OCS

...not the academy. Goes against the received wisdom - but many Academy cadets are
simply well connected. Because they're not as connected, (OCS) are often thought of as second class.
There is an elite clearinghouse in this country that would have you believe the best minds are
coming from the Ivy leagues and the military academies. We've seen what the "best minds" can
do and it ain't pretty. I'm not making the case for crap colleges - only that you could go to
an middle-upper tier university and throw a rock and hit someone more qualified than
many appointees.

[Kittycatkat]

7. sounds about right, children of privilege cheating their way to the top...

just like their parents did.

[Hortensis]

19. Nah. Can't buy into the class resentment fantasy that advantaged

children tend to be spoiled cheaters and that having to work harder for admission makes people more honorable. Anyone can be ambitious and hardworking. Neither training nor struggle will instill a strong moral core in someone who doesn't have the right stuff in himself.

'We've seen what the "best minds" can do and it ain't pretty."' Boy, have we.

We need the best people.

“This above all: to thine own self be true
And it must follow, as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any man/Farewell, my blessing season this in thee!”

[Crowman2009]

8. The best officers are the prior-enlisted ones IMO.

[James48]

14. Yes

Especially if they were NCOs before OCS. I was a Staff Sergeant in an SFC slot, and they said i would have to wait 5 more years before I had enough time in service to make SFC. So I went to OCS instead. Best thing I ever did.

[Aristus]

16. My tank platoon leader when I was in the Gulf in 1991 was a mustang.

He did an enlisted hitch as a tank crewman, then went to OCS and got a commission. We respected the hell out of him.

[sdfernando]

10. My father went through OCS and was commissioned, regular Army....

for much of his career he operated in postings well above his actual rank.

[Bo Zarts]

11. I went through the Army's WOC (warrant officer candidate) program in 1969.

It was and is the hardest, and best, thing that I have ever done. I was fixed-wing (95% of Army aviation at that time was rotary wing). I graduated #1 in my class and was immediately offered a direct commission. Why would I want to do that? The warrant officer rank was by far the best in the Army then, and with extra grades I hear that it is even better now.

There are the jokes about chief warrants making themselves scarce (check), or hanging around the office coffee machine (check), or missing mandatory formations (double check!). I missed a mandatory battalion formation at Ft. Sill, a few months after I returned from Vietnam. A captain was having a hissy (so I was told), and the colonel said, "Captain, get over it! Chief Zarts is flying me to White Sands in the C-47 right after lunch. He doesn't need to be up this damn early!"

[Major Nikon]

13. Many, perhaps but I wouldn't say most

Most if not all members of Congress follow a pretty rigorous standard selection process. It’s fair to say that for any prestigious learning institution, being well connected gets you a leg up. I believe this is less true for service academies than for Ivy League universities.

[Chainfire]

4. It is a shame that some of our best and brightest kids succumb to the overwhelming pressure to

succeed in a very high pressure environment, and now they have to go home in shame. For many of them it will feel like the end of the world. I feel sorry for them for I remember some of the dumb shit I did when I was 18 or 19. Remember, most of those cadets aren't yet old enough to drink. I can find a place in my heart to forgive them and hope that they recover from their error.

[Hortensis]

18. Something to this. We really need develop and prioritize good character

in those being funneled to positions of responsibility, really choose for it, and this is a winnowing. But these adolescents for the most part were raised in societies where dishonesty and immoral behavior in general are so pervasive as to be mostly normal and expected.

Absolutely I hope the good ones go on to do good things and any smelly eggs get permanent setbacks. At least none will be a Lt Gl Flynn, though they can still shoot for president or just mayor of NYC,

[twin_ghost]

5. The bad news for them is that they must pay the government back for their education costs.

A four year degree at Annapolis costs $200k.

[Pas-de-Calais]

9. Fools

[Major Nikon]

12. Fucked around and found out

Cheating at any of the service academies = instant dismissal. There’s no way they couldn’t have known this.

[Demovictory9]

15. it's always physics or that electricity exam

[pfitz59]

17. Wannabe ring-knockers

Got in the Academy on the recommendation of their GQP Congressmen. Selected for 'religious and political conformity', not for brains. Some make it in on academic merits, but far too many are selected for church or political affiliation. And then there are the "jock rocks" selected to make a football team out of a gaggle of would-be engineers. This group are the ones who got caught.. Guaranteed many more are 'pencil-whipping' their exams.