I mean I get that the student broke the rules, at least per this anecdote. And what was done is dishonorable and the student deserves what is coming to the student.

But, I think it gets to a deeper issue with education.

Like, the cynic in me will say that the student learned a new tactic, one that got rewarded, and they are likely to repeat it over and over.

But the teacher, the hopeful part of me, the one that wants growth and striving, that part of me says that the student learned a lesson and is unlikely to repeat that hack. That they got dragged about, told a lot of very tough stories, saw the consequences, and then saw the light, and they will never do it again. And that experience taught them more than the class ever could about life - a much more valuable lesson in the end.

I hope that is what occurred. I think that's probably what the many admins told themself what would happen. I have worked with Princeton grads though, and it is much more likely that nothing of the sort occurred.

Most 'elite' grads think they pulled it over on the school, like they always have, that they were cleverer, somehow. That they 'won', when they really lost and learned worse than nothing, they learned the wrong thing. And then they get out into the real world and they get a successful bigjob and a nice little manageable coke habit and a not as manageable addiction or two. Then a spouse when that time comes and that other line says something no-one really wants, but not with a person they respect or that respects them. And by the time the second kid is done teething, the divorce is done and they think they are 'free' again. So they dive off a cliff in some azure water as the grandkids aren't well taken care of by expensive as hell help.

The ayahuasca vomit dries on the corner of their mouth as they check their actually-personal account for the half dozen 39th birthday wishes, they wonder where it all went wrong. They decide that it was others, not themselves, surely, that can't be true, because Dad was an asshole and Mom really wasn't ever 'there'-there when you think about it.

Because they are still trying to pull one over, to be cleverer, to be the 'good' one at whatever life is in their mind: A long fucking ladder covered in degrees and accolades and tears and jackasses. They live in the derivative.

So, look, don't be butthurt about a jackass undergrad that is too blind and treadmilled to ruin their own life.

But do be butthurt that the system is too fucking tired and old to really deeply care anymore about the young and not just hurting their 'future' - as if that could ever be measured by only a GPA.