Members of the college community are both relieved and disappointed by the decision of the Committee on Standards to drop charges against members of last term's computer science 4 class accused of cheating.
All students interviewed agreed that some cheating took place, however reactions were mixed in how exactly the College should have dealt with the situation.
While some students of last term's CS 4 class refused to comment, others have expressed approval for the decision, saying that the situation seemed too complex for the College to fairly determine who was guilty and who was innocent.
"Considering the circumstances, the committee did the only thing that was just for the majority of the people," Adam Lusthaus '03, a student of CS 4 last term, said. "Deciding who was responsible was impossible."
Julie Greene '02, a student who was charged with cheating, said that she was glad the College chose to be too lenient rather than too harsh.
Students who took Dwyer's CS 4 class last term agreed that some students violated the honor code and many expressed disappointment that they would not be punished.
One such student, Jin Kook Kim '01, said that he believed the College should have pursued the cheating allegations of at least a few members of the class.
"Obviously there was some cheating that did take place. They got away because the people in charge did not know how to go about sorting out who cheated and who didn't," Kim said.
Stephanie Lee '00, another student of CS 4 last term, said that the College made its mistake in charging so many people.
"I felt like the College had boxed itself into a corner, because it made a big annoucement ... when it was clear to me that not all of those cases were legitimate," she said.
She added that if the College had restricted itself to more clear-cut cases, the negative effects of the scandal would have been smaller and the college would have found it easier to punish those who had obviously cheated.
Marcia Kelly, the undergraduate judicial affairs officer, said that she was relieved that the scandal could end.
"There was too great a chance that we might have found people responsible who weren't really responsible," Kelly said. "Defining what was responsible, we were getting into a lot of grey area."
Kelly said that this case would not set a precedent for future COS hearings because of the very unique set of circumstances that surrounded the affair, although the committee will most likely discuss the case in its annual meeting and try to learn from the experience.
In a letter to the Dartmouth community dated March 10, Dean of the College James Larimore and Dean of Faculty Edward Berger explained that the College dropped all 78 charges of cheating against students of last term's CS 4 class taught by visiting professor Rex Dwyer, who was criticized by students for poor teaching and organization.
Hearings were scheduled for 63 of the students. After the COS heard 27 cases in 34 hours of hearings, they made the decision to withdraw all charges.
