Academic Integrity Scrutinized in Press Reports
Aug 24th, 2009 • Posted in: News A Canadian university introduces a grade that represents a new low; student’s suit against college for not getting her a job draws guffaws, but she finds at least one supporter in the media; Columbus Dispatch looks at roots of cheating in article covering aftermath of high-school scandal
VARIOUS DATELINES
Several news stories last week dealt with academics and ethics. Among them:
- Simon Fraser University in British Columbia has introduced a grade lower than an F in order to stigmatize cheating. The new grade, FD, means failed for academic dishonesty. The Globe & Mail reports that university officials say the FD will be reserved for the most egregious cases. Simon Fraser also has a provision in its handbook stating that it can cancel a degree if it is discovered, after graduation, that the student was guilty of academic dishonesty.
- A student who could not find a job after graduating is suing her college, demanding a refund of her tuition and $2,000 in compensation for “undue stress.” Forbes reports that Trina Thompson, in a handwritten lawsuit riddled with spelling errors, claims that Monroe College, a private business college in New York, did not “try hard enough to help.” While her suit has been the target of predictably widespread derision, ABC News’s Mark Gimein maintains that Thompson has a point: “The story of Thompson’s suit isn’t a one-liner about a grad too naïve to know that graduating from college doesn’t guarantee a job. It’s a story about what ‘college’ means and about marginal, for-profit ‘colleges’ that squeeze four years of fees from their students and leave them with all the debt and little of the education or prospects that they counted on.”
- In the aftermath of a cheating scandal at Centerburg High School in Ohio, the Columbus Dispatch examines the roots of the apparent increase in cheating in recent years. One expert interviewed for the piece, Clemson University’s Teddi Fishman, told the Dispatch that part of the reason is that students see grades and graduation as their goals, rather than knowledge or self-improvement. She says less emphasis on testing and more on learning would help change things around: “If improving themselves is the actual goal, then it doesn’t make sense to cheat.”
Sources: Columbus Dispatch, Aug. 21 — Forbes, Aug. 19 — ABC, Aug. 16 — Globe & Mail, Aug. 17.
For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Aug. 10 — Related Newsline story, July 27 — Related Newsline story, Mar. 9 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 16 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 12.
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