Living in the digital world, everything we do can be made public. Using other people's ideas and products and passing them off as your own or not giving credit is considered taboo, leading to ethical risks.

The plagiarism incident in the Genius Olympiad Competition caused the organizers to revoke the student's award and ban the student's instructor from participating in supervision until the end of 2024, leaving a lesson that the emphasis on achievements by adults has unintentionally dragged students into a spiral of dishonesty, disrespect for others and themselves, damaging the child's ego due to cheating and unprofessionalism. It also deprives the student of any opportunity to study in the US in the future, even if his/her profile is qualified, just because the "scar" of academic integrity has been made public in the media.

Illustration photo: VNA

Let’s be honest with each other. How many parents have, are, and will use their finances and social status to influence their children to achieve higher achievements than their children’s actual abilities? How many teachers are still innocently destroying the ability to think independently and creatively in young children by giving them ideas, modeling, or even doing things for them in order to help students win awards and thereby build their own personal brand?

The nature of paid-to-enter competitions and only receiving titles like Genius Olympiad is just an opportunity for children to connect, experience, and broaden their worldview. But adults have distorted its meaning, turning it into a race for achievement, a layer of paint to polish the appearance of the portfolios that parents lack confidence in.

There is nothing wrong with wanting your child to study at the world's top schools. If students set their own goals, have aspirations, commitments and motivation to meet all the requirements for GPA, IELTS, social activities, scientific research, etc., then there is nothing to discuss. However, many parents have to pay tens, even hundreds of millions of VND to study abroad consulting centers to act as models and help them improve their profiles, while students just have to sit and wait for the time to leave, then the story is completely different.

The immediate consequence is that many students are accepted into excellent schools in the US, UK, and Australia but cannot study, become self-conscious, withdrawn, lose motivation and will to strive, fall into depression, and have suicidal thoughts...

Therefore, adults need to learn that the goal for children is not just about titles and achievements. The bigger goal is to help children develop a comprehensive personality, be good at knowledge, strong in mental health and proficient in skills to adapt to changes in life.

Build your child's self-confidence, encourage independence, self-control in thinking, creativity in doing things, teach your child about the importance of honesty, respect for others and respect for themselves. Parents themselves need to model academic integrity because it is an important factor for their children to build a sustainable future.

Assoc. Prof. Dr. TRAN THANH NAM, Head of Faculty of Educational Sciences, University of Education - Vietnam National University, Hanoi

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