Dressing Down on Campus
One night at a restaurant, my son received a message on his cell phone. He’s finishing a three-year fellowship in theater at the University of Florida, and he’s required to teach quite a few classes. I assumed it was about a cancellation or student issue.
“Oh, no, another one,” he said. He showed me a photo on the screen of a very attractive and quite topless woman.
“Who?” I asked, my wife leaning over to get a better view.
“It’s one of my students, and I have to forward this to the dean.”
“Why, does the dean have a collection?”
“When a faculty member receives these and doesn’t immediately inform the dean he can be indefinitely suspended.”
And so, no urban myth at all, it seems it’s quite common (at least on that campus and in these times) for female students to send such photos to male professors. There usually isn’t a message except the implied one: For a good grade, there’s more where this came from.
I recall the “bozo brigade” which occupied a portion of my college experience. These were the kids who didn’t realize that college was there for learning, but thought it was a four-year (for many of them, five- and six-year) obstacle course that their parents were forcing them to negotiate in order to have continued financial support. They cheated on tests, cajoled others to share their work and credit, took the easiest courses, lied about their failure to meet certain obligations, and even hacked the computer grading files. I found them laughable.
Then I met some of the same people in the business world. A few of them, well, had gone quite far. I suppose Bernie Madoff is their patron saint.
When my wife informed me that we couldn’t support our current standard of living if I suddenly became a college professor, I began to wonder what happens to these women after college, especially since some of them have to be successful in their tactics at least some of the time. (A Rutgers study I recall, I think by a professor Doug McCall, showed that the majority of all college students admit to cheating at some point in their studies, with business students coming in worst at a whopping 80 percent.)
Then I realized that the same thing happens to them in all probability as happens to members of the bozo brigade. They give us all a bad name.
© Alan Weiss 2011. All rights reserved.
Daniel Rose
I’m of the same opinion as you. I can’t comprehend the investment of huge sums of money, and not identifying the return isn’t attendance, but learning.
Josh Denton
Love the blog. Thanks for posting a wide array of informative topics and off beat news.
Here is the link summarizing the research you mention, Alan: http://ur.rutgers.edu/medrel/viewArticle.html?ArticleID=3408
Some argue that sharing information isn’t cheating, rather it’s being smart. Being human is a social process fueled by our ancestors. When a person doesn’t understand a topic or process they seek either publications that can explain it, seek experts, or a combination of both. For college is built, partly, on group processes. Some of the examples of cheating meet a gray area.
That’s all nice and well. But, let’s be honest about the young lady: the apple probably didn’t fall far from the tree. Who knows, maybe the parent’s did a ROI analysis and determined this is best the family has to offer. [Hopefully the slight sarcasm can be noted!]
Best,
Josh
Alan Weiss
Sharing makes little sense in competitive situations unless you’re team mates. Helping someone cheat on a test diminishes the worth of the test and falsely elevates someone else’s abilities while diminishing others’. Even as a team mate, you’re creating a weaker team than you could otherwise develop. None of my examples of cheating are “grey” in my estimation. Legitimate help —show me how to study.
Recently, I believe in North Carolina, a professor had proof that most of the class cheated as seniors, and said retake the test or don’t graduate. The most astounding thing were the campus interviews where most students said, “What’s the big deal, everyone does it?” Now those are people I’d like to trust with my firm’s work or my money or my future, right?!
Thanks for writing and I appreciate your points (and the link).