The Ineffectiveness of Honor Codes in Schools Many schools preach academic integrity as a characteristic that all students should have. However, cheating has become incredibly widespread in the modern world, which has led some schools to look for ways to prevent it. One proposed solution has been to implement honor codes that aim to stop cheating, theft and plagiarism and promote integrity. Schools should not try to establish an honor code because it is impossible to stop cheating. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Initially, cheating is inevitable due to technological improvements in the modern era. Specifically, the advent of smartphones has made cheating easier than ever. According to a survey conducted at a small public university, 40% of students reported that they had violated the existing honor code and had not been caught (Source E). Another article from an online publication noted that "research confirms recent media reports regarding the high levels of cheating that exist in many American high schools, with approximately two-thirds of students acknowledging one or more incidents of explicit cheating in 'last year' (Source F). This is already a large percentage of students, and this data was collected before 2010, when telephone technology was less advanced. Nowadays, most people have phones that can send high-resolution images and access the Internet which provides "an inexhaustible source of information" (Source D). This means that cheating can no longer be tracked so easily since it does not have to be committed in person. Students can easily exchange photos of homework or simply look up answers online instead of having to copy them to a classmate. This activity cannot be monitored as it would require teachers to supervise each student's activities on their personal devices, which is an invasion of privacy. Therefore, it is now impossible to stop cheating as technology has transformed it from a physical, in-school act to a wireless, out-of-school act that schools cannot control. Overall, honor codes should not be implemented as technology has made it impossible to prevent cheating. Furthermore, cheating is impossible to stop as students do not want to report each other. To be clear, students are reluctant to report each other for cheating because of the social effects it has. In the survey, it is stated that only 8% of students would report a peer for cheating (Source E). This low number is due to the consequences that reporting someone can have. When an honor code was instituted at a private school in Massachusetts, it was discovered that "[students] feared that the mandate to compare themselves to peers would create friction and that a subsequent report could not easily be kept confidential" (Source B). In other words, students are afraid of having to report a fellow student because they don't want to be known as a snitch and face the reaction of their peers. The people who reported would likely feel resentful towards them, which makes students feel that such an honor code is not worth adhering to. Therefore, such an honor code system is ineffective because children do not want to face the social backlash that comes from reporting a peer for cheating. All in all, an honor code system in schools would be useless because of the social consequences.