Penn State University - La Vie Yearbook (University Park, PA)

Page 30 text:

1'1 s. irlf:fa -5Q .45 aria WHERE TO DRA w THE LINE irighU between collaboration and copyin difficult decision. R EL YING ON HER OWN RESOURCES, ibclowi this student does her best while keeping her integrity. DESPITE EFFORTS TO URTAIL cheating, ibclow righU such as different test forms and proctors, cheating is surprisingly common. Joel Grubcr Joel 0:qu 26 Academic Dishonesty

Page 29 text:

4 Communication In The LASSROO lowly the students filed into the room, a wave of liThey hate me already. lim going to make a fool of mysellm thoughts roared through my mind. Bong, bong. bong.... I heard Old Main and knew that it was now or never. Deep breath...OK, uGood afternoon. My name is... First day teaching assistant jitters were not uncommon. Laura Golden, a biology TA, said, laughing. ill was only a junior when I started. I stuttered the whole way through the first one. llm really surprised the whole class just didnlt drop it. The worst part for many TAs was to get no reaction from the students. Nathalie Chevrin, a French 1 TA from France, said, uIf someone is a volunteer, you feel much better than if you have to ask someone to answer the question. Dennis Ngo, a chemistry TA echoed similar sentiments. lil don't get any response from the students. I feel that is very disappointing. l donit know if they don't understand or just don't care? Dennis had to face another potential problem. He was a foreign TA and was afraid that he would say something wrong or that his students would not understand him. Chiou-Shann Fuh. a computer science TA from Taiwan, said, ul am confident in my professional skill. The most problem is in my language proficiency. Communication problems such as these occurred frequently. Some students felt especially frustrated by foreign teaching assistants. Robin Evans. a senior in marketing, listed the ability to speak English as a top requirement for TAs, and Laurie Christiansen. a seventh semester marketing major, said she had difficulties in lower level math and economics most opting for back row seats. Suddenly, courses with foreign TAs. However. Steve Boyer, a transfer from Berks campus. said, bl donlt think it matters if they're foreign or not. It's pretty naive if you think theyire not good just because theyire foreign. ltis ridiculous. Junior Eric Barnett agreed and said that TAs try hard to help the students by explaining the labs and by demonstrating the equipment so that no one gets hurt. He felt very comfortable going to a TA for help. Laurie, on the other hand, said, iil try hard to avoid going to them. She explained that no matter how she phrased a question her TAs still did not understand it. uThey should have teaching qualities, not just intelligence. lntelligence is shown on paper. not in communicating. TAs were concerned about this. For Nathalie, low participation and few questions in her French class were a concern. illim just wondering if theyire asking all the questions they want to ask? she said. Fuh felt strongly toward his students as well. He said, uWhenever my students ask me a question, 1 will give them the best answer I can. One aspect of teaching was certain. However one felt about TAs, it was not an easy job. Laura said, All I want them ther studentsy to know is that I'm trying really hard. I'm just a student, just like they are. llm not necessarily a know-it-all type of person. The best part. though, according to Laura was that it felt good to be able to help so many people. iil had fun! she smiled. Article by-Pat Hogg Layout bymPat Hogg x- ., --a-.---.--- Dennis O'Connor A 1' THE BEGINNING OF CLASS. Japanese I TA. Craig Rittenhousc, lmndx brick SONIC homework assignments: GI VING SOME HELPFUL HINTS. Dr. Miirycllcn Gleason, head of the instructional dcvc'lopmcnl progrmn, counsels prolbxsors rind TAs on ht-cmning bcllcr teachers. Slew k rcpps Teaching Assistants

Page 31 text:

1' ? mm, , i the best? sit the Penn problem. u rade e and a b r, Anothe an exam, ,1 1'5 two hours before the big math exam, and you still haventt committed all those formulas to memory. What do You do? Keep studying and hope for Or, write out a ttcheat sheet to put Insede your calculator case? ollege students everywhere face this type of nations constantl hil , 6 SO t y W me students path of academic integrity, defined in State Student Handbook as ttthe pursuit of scholarl i ' . actmt free from fraud and deception? y y 3i academic di 3 handbookis included su fabricating dishonesty many others choose the path of shonesty. According to the definition, academic dishonesty eh acts as cheating, plagiarizing, information, facilitating acts of by others, having unauthorized o ' . . p Ssessmn of exams, submitting work of another Pistnpr work previously used without 1 Ormlng the i acalgdem'ic work of others. acaclespite departmental efforts to curtail it, emic dishOnesty seemed to be a growing nstructor, or tampering with the l 1983. a special commission was ggpsmtjed to establish a University-wide policy Suitcalgifmltc disponesw- According to Dr. Don t CC or 0 th Of - Standards. abom e fICe of Conduct reported to his office last year. And that did not ' i f l Clude any of the cases which were n Ormally solve theSSlUdents. o - . . . a me POSSIblc Causes of this increase in the , mount of Che eXCeil in acad 50 cases were officially d between the instructors and ating were the high degree of mong students and the pressures to emics. As one student explained, . s 'ust n Comes'ld mean too much these days. When own to a decision between integrity etter grade, I have to go for that grade. e adage, Estellsdent defended himself with the old measures. . These so-c m Several di perate times breed desperate alled desperate measures were taken f fferent ways. The act of cheating on Or example, could take on many SOME FRIENDLY ASSISTANCE is allowed. but no! direct use ofproccdurcs or whole prognuns. forms-from looking on someone elseis paper to having someone else take a test for you. Expressing his thoughts on cheating, one student said, ttCheating is sheer yankee ingenuity; it takes creativity, skill, and guts? As a senior in Elementary EdiSecondary Math Ed, Diane Bird answered that statement with, ttlf they spent as much time actually learning the material as they do devising methods to avoid learning it, they wouldnit need to cheat in the first placeW For those students who do not cheat, it was usually a simple matter of wanting to feel that they had succeeded on their own merit. Another reason for maintaining academic integrity for some students was simply the fear of getting caught. The consequences of getting caught cheating could be quite serious. Punishments ranged anywhere from those imposed by the instructor, such as receiving an F on the test or in the course, to formal disciplinary sanctions by the Office of Conduct Standards. For first and minor infractions, the incident was usually settled between the instructor and the student. For more serious first offenses, the student would often be dismissed from the University for an indefinite period of time. The most serious incidents were usually met with expulsion from the university or in some cases, degree removal. Whatever the punishment, many students felt it was just not worth the risk involved. Others never felt the need to cheat, and still others thought it was just plain wrong. However, many students felt no aversion to cheating if it was necessary to do well. As one student complained, summing up her thoughts on academic dishonesty, ttltis just not fair for someone to get somewhere by dishonest measures when I work so hard to get there on my own. And it makes me mad to think that they often do. - Article by-Jan Cromo Layout by-eJan Cromo Joel Grubcr WHILE THIS STUDENT KEEPS his eyes on his own paper, others my y be wandering. Academic Dishonesty