Day 61-student ethics

   March 5-Monday means sleeping in for everyone. At least that appears to be the pattern. None of the kids can sleep in past 7am on Saturday or Sunday but Monday rolls around and no one can get up before 7:30. Nonetheless, we all managed to get up, and kids went off to school, and Shan and Sally went to the faculty lounge for our daily espressos.
   One of the more interesting things that I have to consider this week is deciding what type of final exam to offer. On Monday, April 26th, my final will be given from 9am until noon. My choices of exam type are:

Black = Internet access closed, all other supporting material allowed

Blue = Internet access closed and other material partly allowed (according to the teachers instructions)

Red = No supporting material allowed and Internet access closed

Green = All supporting material allowed and Internet access open

   I asked a colleague today about the issue of students cheating on the exam through email or plagiarism and she said it doesn't happen too often but gave three or four examples from last semester where it did happen. In one case, students using the Internet cut and pasted answers for the exam when the exam only allowed computers but no Internet access. In another case, two students emailed back and forth during the exam. Interestingly, none of these students were punished because there seemed to be a question as to whether or not they knew these actions were allowed. One colleague has decided to allow students to use their computer but students must hand-write the exam in order to stop the cutting and pasting of answers.
   Part of Shan's and my interest in the issue of cheating stems from the Icelandic class we have been sitting in on for the past few weeks. Last Friday was the final class and Ian Watson, the instructor, gave a short 16 question quiz covering Icelandic language usage, grammer, history and culture. This short quiz only took 10 minutes but within the first minute or two at least two groups of students were whispering about the answers in German. I'm sure Ian knew about it because he had already complained about the falling academic standards and that most students don't care about learning but just want the high grade. During our lunch a few weeks back, Ian had given examples of blatant plagiarism for masters theses and how no one objected or stopped the students from earning their degrees.
   It is depressing to realize questions about academic integrity are needed world-wide. But, it is one more thing that make Bifröst University very similar to Western State College.