On Tuesday, The Daily Caller posted an article about Princeton University’s Honor Code.

The article reports:

A Princeton University student argued in a Sunday night opinion article that the school’s Honor Code unfairly impacts racial minorities, citing parallels to the U.S. criminal justice system.

The Ivy League school’s Undergraduate Honor Code lays out standards for student conduct that all undergraduate students must abide by and prohibits students from plagiarizing or cheating, according to its website. Emilly Santos, author of the op-ed and Princeton University student, likened the code to the United States criminal justice system to propose that it “disadvantages” minority students.

If all students are required to adhere to the standards of the Honor Code, how is it racist?

The article continues:

“Princeton’s Honor Code, tasked with holding students accountable and honest in academic settings, mirrors the criminal justice system in its rules and effects,” Santos wrote. “It is harmful to the entirety of the Princeton community: the fear it instills in students fosters an environment of academic hostility. But it is often most damaging for first-generation low-income (FLI) students — students who also often belong to racial minorities.”

Honor Code violations include “tampering with a graded exam,” “claiming another’s work to be one’s own” and obtaining a exam materials prior to the examination date, the website reads.

Students who violate the Honor Code may be reprimanded, suspended, placed on probation or expelled, according to the university’s website. Students who are suspended for a semester are not eligible for university financial aid for the repeated semester, according to the university, however Santos argues this harms FLI students who rely on financial aid and would be plunged further in debt.

If you are that easily intimidated by ‘academic hostility’, maybe you should go to a less expensive school where you are under less pressure to achieve. We used to teach children that cheating was wrong. I would hope that we will continue to do that.