Grades

found here

This time of year always gives me fits. I'm an educator of university students. One would think that they would be mature, responsible, accountable, timely--all the things that their younger high school counterparts are not known for.
But at this time of year there seems to be no difference between the two.

I recall the first paper I read in my university teaching career. There was an odd, lurching quality to it. The writer was not articulate in class, nor was she particularly astute. And yet her paper contained both brilliant observations and ponderous, inane remarks. Bells went off in my head. I wondered if she had plagiarized.
After a trip to the library to find the one cited work in her paper, I opened the book to a page from which she had copied several paragraphs, verbatim. I was stunned. Now I had the most unpleasant task of confronting her about engaging in behavior that is defined as academic dishonesty.
When I called her in, I first asked her if she would please define plagiarism. She did that correctly. Then I handed her a copy of her paper in which I had highlighted every remark I could find that had been plagiarized from the library book. I asked her to explain what I was seeing.
This was the point at which my lofty notions about being a university professor took on a more realistic perspective.
After a few moments of thinking about her paper, she volunteered, "I don't think that the woman who wrote this for me understood what plagiarism is."
This was an intriguing twist.
"And why did someone else write your paper?"
"Because I have cancer and had too much going on to write it."
"What kind of cancer do you have?"
"It's a kind you don't know anything about."
Do tell.

Suddenly, in my mind I was back in third grade, standing in the cloak room of our two-room schoolhouse. Miss Lawrence was standing over me menacingly with one hand on my shoulder.
"Why did you put grass down Bernice's pants?"
"Because...well..."
"Don't you know that's not a nice thing to do and it made her cry?"
"Well...I thought she wouldn't mind it." Lie! I was teasing a defenseless, slow girl and could offer no other lame excuse than that.
"How would you like it if someone did that to you?" Miss Lawrence's mouth was very tight around the edges.
"I don't think I'd mind too much."
And around we went. I was fighting for all I was worth to go toe-to-toe with Miss Lawrence and she was trying to get me to admit my wrongdoing and repent. Neither of us got what we wanted at that moment. I know that Bernice surely didn't. She picked grass out of the back of her pants for several hours that afternoon, sitting right up there in the second row of desks at the front of the room.

And my plagiarizing student wasn't about to give in, either. Even when I sent her to the dean's office for a formal reprimand, she told me that she didn't appreciate having her reputation tarnished with allegations of misconduct. I could have wrung her neck.

I'm sitting her at my desk with two class rosters in front of me. Students have been told from the beginning of the term that they MUST turn in four types of paperwork by December 8th in order to get credit for their practicum course. This instruction was given before class and in two subsequent mass emails from my office. These are master's and doctoral level students. Sixteen (16) out of 53 students did not get their paperwork in to me on time. So I'm assigning 16 (count them) incompletes for this class. When I spoke with two students today, whose paths I crossed, one looked blankly at me as though I was addressing her in Swahili, and the other girl blanched and begged mercy. But 16 of these mature, adult students, will get an incomplete and a written reprimand.

Hhrmph. @%#*$!.

It will all be over tomorrow.