When my daughter arrived home from school, she was obviously upset and angry. She said that during a test, the student sitting next to her had copied the answers from her, Sarah's, scantron sheet. To make matters worse, the student who cheated was bragging that without studying at all, she had scored 95% on the test.

Sarah asked me what I thought she should do about this problem. I advised Sarah to talk to her instructor and follow his suggestions. She talked to him, and he suggested that if the same student sat next to her when they were taking their next test, Sarah should mark all of the answers incorrectly, and then Sarah could retake the test.

At the next test, the cheating student sat next to Sarah, who followed her teacher's advice and marked the answers incorrectly. When the test results came out in class, Sarah had scored 98% and the student who sat next to her had scored 0. Also, the student sitting next to the student who had copied from Sarah also received a 0 on the test. Neither of these two students attended that class again.

Questions:

Was it ethical for Sarah's teacher to tell her to let the other student copy the wrong answers?

Was it ethical for Sarah to do this?

Did the other students get what they deserved?

What other alternatives might Sarah's teacher have chosen?