What Makes America Great

What Makes America Great I like America because there is opportunity here. I also like Americabecause of our government that is a democratic government. In other coun‚Â ¬tries, their government's are monarchies, or a dictatorship, or evenauthoritarian. Some countries are even capitalistic. Here we have the freedomto sell buy or trade anything that we want. Another reason that I like arecountry is that it is full of states. Many of the other counties don't have states.The privileges are vast because that we do. Some privileges are: you don'talways have to stay where you are you have the freedom to move. Now somestates have different laws but all are good here. Everyone in America has theright to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of happiness. If any of these rights aretaken away then you have the right to go to court. There are many differenttypes of courts.United Statesthere is a District court, a Circuit court, (the only one with ajury) , a Special Appeals court, and an Appeals court. The court that you wi llgo to depends on your situation. Our government is made up of three differentbranches. They are the Executive branch, Legislative branch and the Judicialbranch. All of these branches check one another so that there is no foul ups.The reason for the three branches is to split up the power and work. This isdone so that no one branch has more power that the other. I think that othersshould move to America because of the opportunity the U. S. has to offer.The U.S. has many jobs and schools. The schools in the U.S. are great theyteach you all that you would possibly want to know. I know that in somecountries the men can...

Cantebury Tales

Cantebury Tales Essay Canterbury Tales In discussing Chaucers collection of stories called The Canterbury Tales, an interesting picture or illustration of the Medieval Christian Church is presented. However, while people demanded more voice in the affairs of government, the church became corrupt this corruption also led to a more crooked society. Nevertheless, there is no such thing as just church history; This is because the church can never be studied in isolation, simply because it has always related to the social, economic and political context of the day. In history then, there is a two way process where the church has an influence on the rest of society and of course, society influences the church. This is naturally because it is the people from a society who make up the church. and those same people became the personalities that created these tales of a pilgrimage to Canterbury. The Christianization of Anglo-Saxon England was to take place in a relatively short period of time, but this was not because of the success of the Augustinian effort. Indeed, the early years of this mission had an ambivalence which shows in the number of people who hedged their bets by practicing both Christian and Pagan rites at the same time, and in the number of people who promptly apostatized when a Christian king died. There is certainly no evidence for a large-scale conversion of the common people to Christianity at this time. Augustine was not the most diplomatic of men, and managed to antagonize many people of power and influence in Britain, not least among them the native British churchmen, who had never been particularly eager to save the souls of the Anglo-Saxons who had brought such bitter times to their people. In their isolation, the British Church had maintained older ways of celebrated the major festivals of Christianity, and Augustines effort to compel them to conform to modern Roman usage only angered them. When Augustine died (some time between 604 and 609 AD), then, Christianity had only a precarious hold on Anglo-Saxon England, a hold which was limited largely to a few in the aristocracy. Christianity was to become firmly established only as a result of Irish efforts, who from centers in Scotland and Northumbria made the common people Christian, and established on a firm basis the English Church. At all levels of society, belief in a god or gods was not a matter of choice, it was a matter of fact. Atheism was an alien concept (and one dating from the eighteenth century). Living in the middle ages, one would come into contact with the Church in a number of ways. First, there were the routine church services, held daily and attended at least once a week, and the special festivals of Christmas, Easter, baptisms, marriages, etc.. In that respect the medieval Church was no different to the modern one. Second, there were the tithes that the Church collected, usually once a year. Tithes were used to feed the parish priest, maintain the fabric of the church, and to help the poor. Third, the Church fulfilled the functions of a civil service and an education system. Schools did not exist (and were unnecessary to a largely peasant society), but the Church and the government needed men who could read and write in English and Latin. The Church trained its own men, and these went to help in the government: writing letters, keeping accounts and so on. The words cleric and clerk have the same origin, and every nobleman would have at least one priest to act as a secretary. The power of the Church is often over-emphasized. Certainly, the later medieval Church was rich and powerful, and that power was often misused especially in Europe. Bishops and archbishops were appointed without any training or clerical background, church offices changed hands for cash, and so on. The authority of the early medieval Church in England was no different to that of any other landowner. So, the question that haunted medieval man was that of his own salvation. The existence of God was never questioned and the heart-cry of medieval society was a desire to know God and achieve intimacy with the divine. Leading a life pleasing to God was the uppermost concern, and the wide diversity of medieval piety is simply because people answered the question, How can I best lead a holy life? in so many different ways. Beginning with The Pardoners Tale, the theme of salvation is truly paramount. Chaucer, being one of the most important medieval authors, uses this prologue and tale to make a statement about buying salvation. The character of the pardoner is one of the most despicable pilgrims, seemingly along for the ride to his next gig as the seller of relics. For myn entente is nat but for to winne,/ And no thing for correccion of sinne, admits the pardoner in his prologue. As a matter of fact, the pardoner is only in it for the money, as evident from this passage:I wol none of the Apostles countrefete: I wold have moneye, wolle, cheese, and whete, Al were it yiven of the pooreste page, Or of the pooreste widwe in a village Al sholde hir children sterve for famine. Nay, I drinke licour of the vine And have a joly wenche in every town. In his tale, the Pardoner slips into his role as the holiest of holies and speaks of the dire consequences of gluttony, gambling, and lechery. He cites Attila the Hun with, Looke Attila, the grete conquerour,/ Deide in his sleep with shame and dishonour,/ Bleeding at his nose in dronkenesse. The personification of the deadly sins, along with his story of the three greedy men that eventually perish at the hands of their sin is a distinct medieval device. The comic twist that Chaucer adds to the device, though, is that the Pardoner in himself is as the personification of sin, as is evident from the passages of his prologue. At the conclusion of his tale, the Pardoner asks, Allas, mankinde, how may it bitide/ That to thy Creatour which that thee wroughte,/ And with his precious herte blood boughte,/ Thou art so fals and unkinde, allas?. He then goes on to offer each pilgrim a place READ: Robotics Essayfor a price, of course. The Pardoners place in Chaucers idea of redemption becomes evident in the epilogue of the tale. After offering the host the first pardon (For he is most envoluped in sinne and, supposedly, the equivalent of Chaucer), the host berates the pardoner, saying, I wolde I hadde thy coilons in myn hond,/ In stede of relikes or of saintuarye./ Lat cutte him of. By this, the idea of the pardoner as the most important man on the pilgrimage is brought to fruition and Chaucer makes the main point of this tale: Salvation is not for sale. Another example of the medieval obsession with redemption. However, some did not accept this and questioned the church It was what they wanted other than a holy life with a Old-Testament God; That style of thinking evenually lead to a more gentle, mother-figure as a goddess The Cult of the Virgin. The eminent question then becomes, Why would people change from a long-lasting, Old-Testament God to a mother-like goddess ? The answer is simply because they thought their new found Goddess would never be as harsh on people as the often criticized male like aspect of God. In both current Catholicism and that of the medieval period, Mary is worshipped with more fervor than even God or Jesus. Church after church was (and still is) erected in her name. Her likeness graced statues and stained glass with as much frequency as Jesus bloody head. The worship of Mary is fervent, institutionalized, and approved of by the Christian church. Is she not a goddess? Mary simply took the place of the female aspects of the spirit that were once worshipped as Roman or Anglo-Saxon goddesses. The medieval period, stretching approximately from the late seventh century to the early sixteenth, was bound together under one constantRoman Catholic Christianity. But beneath this curtain of Christianity many legends were being formed and passed down, as old pagan traditions became assimilated into a newly Christian society. The two religious forms were becoming intertwined. They seemed at this time to be tolerant of each other, not entirely distinct. A peoples habits and thought processes are not easily changed, and being that the Anglo-Saxons of Britain were not Christians until the mid-600s, a period of transition can be expected . At least, a fascination with their pagan ancestors existed, at most, the practice of the old ways. Examples of a fascination with magic, worshipping more than one god-like figure, and a continuing love for worshipping goddesses, exist in many texts written in this period. Yet, this does not mean that every village had a sorceress in their midst, but literature usually reflects the society within which it emerges. At the time of The Canterbury Tales, many of a people who were Christians officially, politically, and in most cases at heart, saw that there were elements of paganism and sorcery which is tolerated and respected. The society in which Chaucer writes these stories is Christian as well, politically and spirituallycould it be that they tolerated and respected paganism and magic? Perhaps the separation of the two is not necessary and was not complete at this point in time. Not only was magic a pagan tradition that persisted throughout the Middle Ages. .another tradition, changing at the time, reflected the transition from worshipping the unseen forces in the world as many gods, to one, omnipotent God. Although the people were Christians, they took the separation of spiritual powers far beyond the creation the Trinity. The specific powers or emphasis given to each saint carries on even into todays Catholic tradition. The medieval period may have had some of this (although many of the saints were not even born yet) but in their literature, many immortal and powerful creatures are found. This form of Paganism existed in Britain of the Middle ages, full of spiritual beings, full of magic, alive with heavenly power existing on Earth. It has been the nature of the Christian men in power through the ages to, for fear, deny their people the knowledge of the un-Christian richness in their ancestry, and so the traditions that were not masked as Christian are lost to students of Christian history and literature. But it seems this period had not seen such extensive discrimination. The two ways of the world were not quite so separate then, and matters of the occult were not yet labeled as evil. This again implies that perhaps the two forms of religious thought do not have to be completely separate. There are strong similarities for them to coincide and complement each other, and for an entire people trying to make the Christian transition, maybe this complementing was necessary. However, the age of forceful patriarchy and witch-burning would not come about for several hundred years. Each new way of leading a holy life was thought to be progressively more acceptable to God by its proponents than the ones that had gone before. Such new ways were normally inspired by a desire to break away from the corruption and worldliness which was perceived in the older or more established forms of Godly living. These new ways often became corrupt themselves and over time breakaways from them were hailed as a newer and more perfect way of following God. This roller-coaster ride of corruption and reform is basically the story of popular medieval religion as man battled to define and discover what it really meant to be a Christian. In an effort to escape persecution, but to also flee the evil, prevalent in the world and to seek God free from many worldly distractions, monks began to assemble as communities of Christians . These communities, although they had little organization, were regarded as possessing the best Christian life by having a solitary, ascetic, celibate existence where the world had been totally renounced and had been entirely replaced with heavenly contemplation. These new martyrs were usually just called monks: theirs was a life of daily martyrdom as they constantly died to self and lived totally for God. The monks paid particular veneration to the physical remains of the martyrs (relics) and were therefore connected to the martyrs who they replaced. The rise of ascetic monasticism and relic worship however was quite controversial Both the worship of relics and ascetic monasticism however became mainstays of this Medieval religion, and the idea that monks were a new form of martyr persisted over time. READ: Moral and Ethical Dilemmas Essay Both monks as well as martyrs were looked upon as holy men. In relating this solitary world to readers, there is also a monk in Chaucers work He is someone who combined godliness and worldliness into a profitable and comfortable living. He was the outrider or the person in charge of the outlying property.. ..which lead him to enjoy hunting, fine foods, and owning several horses. Monks renounced all their worldly belongings and by taking vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, joined a community of monks. Their lives were spent in communal worship, devotional reading, prayer and manual labor all under the authority of the abbot of the monastic house. Particular monks often had particular jobs- the cellarer or the infirmarer for example, and these like every aspect of monastic life were laid down in the Rule. Monks were nearly always of noble extraction (one had to have wealth in order to give it up) but could also be given to the monastery as children (called oblates) to be brought up as monks. Hindsight has blurred our vision of the Medieval monk and the result is that the modern Christian mindset has condemned him for his selfish escapism from the world and for his apparent neglect of those who needed Christ outside of the cloister. The Medieval mindset was very different. The monastery was an integral part of the local community it probably owned most of the farming land in the area- and the fortunes of the people in any area were bound up with the spirituality of its monastic house. The monks were on the front line of the spiritual battle-it was they who did battle in prayer for their community, who warded off devils and demons and who prayed tirelessly for the salvation of the souls of those in their community. Rather than being the cowards of Christianity unable to take the strain of living a Christian life in the real world, the monks were like spiritual stormtroopers interceding for an area against its supernatural enemies in mudh the same way as a local lord in his castle protected an area against its physical enemies. The people gave gifts to both lord and abbot in return for a service. The Pardoner also represents the tradition of faith in respect to the church of his time. The Pardoner is representative of the seamy side of the corrupt church and a broken or twisted (if you will) faith. The faith of a bureaucracy, which is what the church had become. The Pardoner was a church official who had the authority to forgive those who had sinned by selling pardons and indulgences to them. Although, the Pardoner was a church official, he was clearly in the church business for economic reasons. The Pardoner, a devious and somewhat dubious individual had one goal: Get the most money for pardons by almost any means of coercion necessary. A twisted and ironic mind, has basically defined himself through his work for a similarly corrupt church. In contrast, the Plowman has nothing but a seemingly uncomplicated and untwisted faith. The Plowman has the faith of a poor farmer, uncomplicated by the bureaucracy of the church. The Pardoner is probably on this journey because he is being required to go by the church or he sees some sort of economic gain from this voyage, most likely from selling forgiveness to the other pilgrims. The Plowman on the other hand is probably on this voyage because of his sincerity and faith in its purpose. While this was the story of religion at grass-roots level, at the organizational and hierarchical level, the church developed along a different line. It became more organized, more bureaucratic, more legal, more centralized and basically more powerful on a European scale. This process was spearheaded by the papacy and reached its pinnacle under Pope Innocent III in the early 13th Century. He embodied what became known as the papal monarchy a situation where the popes literally were kings in their own world. The relative importance of spiritual and secular power in the world was a constant question in the middle ages with both secular emperors and kings, and the popes asserting their claims to rule by divine authority with Gods commands for Gods people proceeding out of their mouths. The power of the church is hard to exaggerate: its economic and political influence was huge, as its wealth, movements like the crusades, and even the number of churches that exist from this period truly show its greatness. By the early 10th century, a strange malaise seems to have entered the English church. There are comments from this time of a decline in learning among churchmen and an increase in a love for things of this earthly world. Even more of these lax standards had begun a decline in the power structure of the church which included a decrease in acceptable behavior amongst churchmen and a growing use of church institutions by lay people as a means of evading taxes. Christianity affected all men in Europe at every level and in every way. Such distances however, led to much diversity and the shaping of Medieval religion into a land of contrasts. One can also see how mans feelings of extreme sinfulness and desire for God are quite evident in these tales. Still, we are told that history repeats itself because nobody listens to it, but more realistically history repeats itself because man is essentially the same from one generation to the next. He has the same aspirations, fears and flaws; yet the way that these are expressed differs from age to age. This is why each period of history is different. The fact that man is the same yet different is what makes the study of the people who formed the medieval church directly applicable to Christians lives and experiences today. Book Reports

Global marketing strategy and product launch B&Q in Malaysia Essay

Global marketing strategy and product launch B&Q in Malaysia - Essay Example Current study reviews the potentials of B&Q, a well-known British firm, in the Malaysian market. The firm already operates in the international market. Still, up today the firm has not attempted to enter the Malaysian market. The successful operation of the firm in Chinese market has possibly caused the delay of such project. The stability, at least up to now, of the European market in which the firm is highly expanded, could be another reason for the avoidance of the firm to expand overseas. On the other hand, the review of the Malaysian market had led to the assumption that the particular market could highly benefit the performance of B&Q. The firm’s profits could be increased while the risks involved would be limited, at least taking into consideration the market’s current characteristics. A marketing plan has been developed for the potential expansion of B&Q in the Malaysian market. The requirements and the implications of the specific plan are analytically presente d. It is proved that the entrance of firm in the Malaysian market would have many prospects for success, especially if all phases of the plan were carefully monitored. 2. Background of the organization 2.1 Products B&Q has a wide range of products in regard to home and garden improvement. Currently, the products of the firm are estimated to 40,000 (B&Q Company website, Company Information 2012). 2.2 Market position B&Q is ‘the largest home improvement and garden centre retailer in UK’ (B&Q Company website, Company Information 2012). The firm was first established in 1969. Today, the firm is owned by Kingfisher plc, a major competitor in the context of the European’s home improvement industry; Kingfisher plc has also the third position in the global home improvement industry (B&Q Company website, Company Information 2012). In UK, the firm’s stores are estimated to 350 (B&Q Company website, Company Information 2012). For 2011, the firm’s profits were estimated to ‘?3.8 billion’ (B&Q Company website, Company Information 2012), making the organization one of the most powerful competitors in the home improvement industry worldwide. The firm is already well established in the global market with about 60 stores (B&Q Company website, Company Information 2012). The firm’s financial performance is presented in Figure 1 (Appendix). The firm’s performance in UK and France seems to be much higher compared to its performance internationally (Figure 2, Appendix). The expansion of the firm in Malaysia could enhance the performance of the organization in the context of the global market. 2.3 Organizational objectives and vision The organization’s key objective is ‘to help people create a home that they are proud of’

Reading questions for white in jakarta Coursework

Reading questions for white in jakarta - Coursework Example It is human nature to be curious of other cultures and people. Every culture in the world is defined by the dominant race and not through its own means. Some people who feel uncomfortable being identified as a particular race pretend that they are part of the crowd and do not stand out so much. Non-white cultures often have words to call white people. These words can be offensive if used in the wrong manner, but primarily they are non-threatening even if somewhat impolite. White culture tries to portray the view that it is not marked because otherwise it would not have power over non-white cultures. 1. Through reading this I did agree that white people do not really have a defined culture. There are very few celebrations specifically for white people because they seem to be able to celebrate every occasion. It is other cultures that are marked because they have their own celebrations and festivities that are important to them. For white culture to gain importance there needs to be more of a celebration of it. 2. I had not thought that it was rude to call white people a slang term. These terms have always been used to call white people because they are different and stand out, especially when they are in an environment where they are in the minority. 3. The thing I am confused about is why other cultures seem to cope better, or assimilate better, when they enter a dominant white culture, yet the reverse does not produce the same results. I mean that white people who live in countries other than their own tend to struggle because they have been used to being the dominant culture and suddenly are not anymore. I think that it is interesting who white people are portrayed in movies and on television. Because they are the dominant culture, they seem to be able to play every role. Yet people of other ethnicities only have few roles available to them, and those roles will likely fill a stereotype. Why are so

History of Egypt Essay -- Historical Egypt Africa Cairo Essays Papers

History of Egypt The rich history of Egypt is tied very closely with the Nile River’s fertile banks and existence as a source of water. Flowing south to north, this massive river has had a tremendous impact on agriculture, transportation, religion, migration of populations, and culture as a whole. The narrow Nile Valley as well as the surrounding deserts provided defense and isolation from the arising cultures of the time. Over many centuries, the rainfall has affected the levels of flooding on the Nile and therefore the way in which the Egyptians had to live. This region is rich with cultural and historical records of the ongoing relationship of culture and society with the environment and the Nile. Cairo is the capital of Egypt and is the biggest city not only in Egypt but the Middle East as well. With a current population of over 15 million inhabitants, the city has evolved for over four thousand years with a variety of social and cultural influences. Northern Africa has been occupied by Ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, and Turks and monuments that still stand today are evidence of these influences. Cairo has been known by many names, including Memphis, Heliopolis, Babylon, and, Al-Qahira. The city was a center of religious development for Christianity, Judaism, and Islam throughout its thirty or more dynasties. Over 8,000 years ago, Northern Africa was rich with diverse wildlife including elephants, buffalo, hippopotami, and giraffe (Lamb). However by 5,000 BC, some of these species began to die out or migrate from this region, perhaps due to the increased migration of humans and settling near the Nile. The Nile was the best and only source of fresh water in the area and its annual flooding and receding le... ...In 1882, the British seized control of Egypt until it could repay its debts. Egypt gained its independence in 1952 and has continued to grow, with Cairo being the centerpiece of ongoing development (www.lonelyplanet.com). Throughout the 1960’s and 1970’s, the West Bank of the Nile River was concreted over to make room for urban sprawl. The relationship of the city with the Nile was becoming less cooperative and increasingly damaging to its natural state. Cairo expanded north into Nasr City in what has become an eyesore to the landscape. Cairo has even expanded up and over the Muquattam Hills, which once stood as a barrier to previous eastern growth. The rapid expansion of Cairo seems as if it will pose a serious problem to the Nile and its resources as transportation, industry, and residential construction litter the banks of the once coveted and worshipped Nile.

Professional Cheating Websites Essay

Random interview is the method that we are going to use for gathering data because in interviews information is obtained through inquiry and recorded by enumerators. Structured interviews are performed by using survey forms, whereas open interviews are notes taken while talking with respondents. The notes are subsequently structured interpreted foe further analysis. Open-ended interviews, which need to be interpreted and analyze even during the interview, have to be carried out by well-trained observers and/or enumerators. Generally, structured interviews are conducted with a well-designed form already established. Forms are filled in by researches, instead of respondents, and in that it differs from questionnaires. While this approach is more expensive, more complicated questions can be asked and data can be validated as it is collected, improving data quality. Interviews can be undertaken with variety of data sources, and through alternative media, such as by telephone or in person . The people who are going to interview are the maritime students of Dr,Yanga’s Colleges at DYCI. The interviewee came from any level of BSMT and BSMarE maritime student .It could be ages 16 to 18 above male or female. Confessions of a Professional College Cheater. IT WILL COME as news to no one who reads Dave Tomar’s new book that college kids cheat as enthusiastically and ritually as they tailgate and copulate, especially since Harvard recently announced that nearly half of the 279 students in a single â€Å"Introduction to Congress† class are under investigation for academic dishonesty. In the ethically challenged haze of freshman dormitory life I did it myself, writing an occasional paper for an attractive or underperforming friend, and it never really occurred to me that this was wrong until I became a college professor and sat outraged on the other side of the desk, interrogating a barely literate student who had suddenly blossomed into an eloquent critic of Milton’s Paradise Lost. And after reading The Shadow Scholar I’m eyeing my current crop of students with an entirely new level of suspicion. Tomar’s book grew out of an article, penned under the name â€Å"Ed Dante† in The Chronicle of Higher Education in November 2010, that became the most widely read piece in the Chronicle’s history. The article, and now the book, document the astounding scale and sophistication of cheating in today’s wired world, which the author knows well: he worked for ten years at highly organized Internet companies, writing term papers, class projects, and even a dissertation. In the wickedest of ironies, he found his employers through a website that aims to prevent cheating by exposing the worst offenders. At this website, an interested reader will find links to two hundred such companies, all accepting Paypal, MasterCard, and Visa, and all eager to make your college experience utterly painless. One site (CustomWritings.com) provides statistics, including (at press time) a 97 percent satisfaction rate and 1,373,890 pages written. I don’t now how much to trust a company that relies on its customers’ willingness to lie, but if those numbers are true, then this firm alone has produced over 170,000 of the 7-to-10-page papers usually assigned in introductory level classes. Many sites promise that their writers hold at least an M.A. or a Ph.D., and nearly all of them guarantee that the customer’s essay will cruise through the plagiarism-detection software that most American universities have purchased, at a tremendous cost, as the silver bu llet in their anti-cheating arsenal. As Tomar describes the process, the writers for his former employer log in to the company’s website and select an assignment from an online bulletin board. Students provide the topic and the deadline, and specific guidelines from their instructor, and the desired citation style. Some students even ship required course texts to their hired hand: Tomar claims this practice larded his shelves with thousands of dollars worth of books on constitutional history, literature, business, and psychology. But that was one of the few perks. Like a high-tech whipping boy, Tomar says he took on so much work that he ruined his health and his relationships, all so that the pampered and unprepared could enjoy a painless college experience. The cheery photos of carefree students on the professional cheating websites bear this out. As in the promotional materials distributed by the universities themselves, everyone is always smiling. Tomar is very, very angry, and although he comes to loathe the students who hire him, the real target of his ire is the universities. He is himself a graduate of Rutgers, and he seems genuinely traumatized by his own stint on the banks of the old Raritan, which he believes left him without the skills to land any real job other than writing fraudulent college papers. From this experience he gleans several ways that higher education in America has gone awry. â€Å"It’s not simply that some colleges are structured more like corporations than like places of learning,† Tomar notes, but that they are structured like failing businesses that â€Å"don’t give a crap about customer service or quality assurance.† This is one of Tomar’s more astute observations. While nimble businesses, from Lego to Apple, have made customers fall in love with their reinvented products, universities still persist in replicating the early twentieth-century factory model espoused by Henry Ford: customers can have a car painted any color they want â€Å"so long as it is black.† As a teacher of Shakespeare, I benefit from this model all the time: students from across the disciplines are forced to take my classes to fill various requirements, whether or not they will ever use iambic pentameter. It pays my bills. But where such requiremen ts do not correspond to clearly defined and valuable outcomes for students, they also contribute to the truly frightening $1 trillion in outstanding U.S. student debt that, as Tomar notes, has mostly been accumulated in the past four years. The driving engines of that debt remain the for-profit degree mills such as theUniversity of Phoenix, which do not escape Tomar’s fury. â€Å"The work assigned at such institutions was so easy, the standards so low, and the priorities so far removed from the interests of honest student evaluation† that students might be forgiven for turning to the free market to meet their intellectual needs. As the Harvard cheating scandal has affirmed, however, even the best universities have some such slack in the system. Students caught up in the investigation have reported that the course was notoriously known as â€Å"an easy A† with take-home exams and low standards. Combine such factors with the universities’ generally sluggish stance toward technology, Tomar suggests, and the cheating he documents is nearly inevitable. These points are well made, but not much else in this padded book has the same force. In discussing his erstwhile career, Tomar has called himself a master â€Å"bullshit artist,† and he boasts that he knows all the â€Å"little tricks† for churning out papers, â€Å"like fluffing sentences with unnecessary clauses or adding gratuitous lines summarizing previous claims.† Yet Tomar’s book may prove to be his bullshitting pià ¨ce de rà ©sistance, as it employs these same techniques at length, including notes and a bibliography drawn mostly from blogs and websites. For a brief moment, it seems as if this might be some sort of brilliant meta-narrative: a Joycean performance of the sloppiness, clichà ©, and superficial analysis that passes for writing in our universities today. But as Tomar reaches his solemn conclusion, explaining that he has attempted to describe â€Å"the things that I had come to know, with the hope that it could help all of us,† this begins to seem less likely. The problem is that The Shadow Scholar’s argument never really achieves the escape velocity that would propel it beyond the author’s own miscellaneous grievances. By his own admission, Tomar doesn’t know how to use a library and doesn’t have â€Å"a fuck’s clue how to do research if my Internet is down and my phone battery i s dead.† For Tomar this is a point of pride, because the ease with which he manipulates the system—tricking all those doddering professors—shows that libraries and library-based curricula are hopeless anyway. Again, I half-sympathize: if any professors still ask students to conduct research without online resources, they are clearly acting negligently. But surely the more responsible—and the more common—approach is to guide students through the digital archives, accepting that they use Wikipedia and Google, but teaching them that this should be the beginning rather than the end of their research. But Tomar obviously never learned this lesson, and his argument rarely reaches beyond the level of Googling, like one of those machine-authored books that use an algorithm to collate information about a given topic. (If this is unfamiliar, see the 345,000 titles by â€Å"Lambert M. Surhone† on Barnesandnoble.com.) When arguing, for example, that American education l oads students with debt without providing the skills to pay it back, Tomar writes that â€Å"according to the Guardian, ‘student loans have been stripped of nearly all basic consumer protections.’† Nothing wrong with that, except that after continuing this quotation for some length, he launches directly into a new paragraph on â€Å"An article in Mother Jones,† and this takes us to a paragraph relating what â€Å"the Washington Post† surmises, before a final section provides the truth â€Å"according to the New York Times.† The already underdeveloped argument must also share space with a memoir of the author’s misguided youth, and while Dave Tomar finds his lead character fascinating, his will probably be a minority response. After the tenth account of Tomar getting stoned, or reeling out of a bar to vomit, it seems worth asking whether he may have borne some responsibility for his failure to find academic fulfillment and develop marketable skills on campus. One suspects that Tomar was very good at churning out â€Å"C-† papers and that some of his clients got exactly what they deserved. Although The Shadow Scholar is a failed invective, it is an extremely timely reminder that we would be unwise to brush off accounts of cheating at Harvard or our local junior college as a few bad apples. To prevent the offenses that Tomar describes, professors will also need to become more proficient at pedagogies both old and new. Our first priority may be teaching students to navigate an online world where the meaning of intellectual property is in flux. Universities clearly must also do a better job teaching students actual skills rather than running them through hoops until they accumulate enough seat time, measured in dollars and hours, to graduate. Just as important as such innovation, however, is the very traditional work of forming tutorial relationships that will model intellectual responsibility and demonstrate that thinking, rather than paying someone to do it for you, can be its own reward. Studies find more Students Cheating, with High Achievers no Exception. Large-scale cheating has been uncovered over the last year at some of the nation’s most competitive schools, like Stuyvesant High Schoolin Manhattan, the Air Force Academy and, most recently, Harvard. Studies of student behavior and attitudes show that a majority of students violate standards of academic integrity to some degree, and that high achievers are just as likely to do it as others. Moreover, there is evidence that the problem has worsened over the last few decades. Experts say the reasons are relatively simple: Cheating has become easier and more widely tolerated, and both schools and parents have failed to give students strong, repetitive messages about what is allowed and what is prohibited. â€Å"I don’t think there’s any question that students have become more competitive, under more pressure, and, as a result, tend to excuse more from themselves and other students, and that’s abetted by the adults around them,† said Donald L. McCabe, a professor at the Rutgers University Business School, and a leading researcher on cheating. â€Å"There have always been struggling students who cheat to survive,† he said. â€Å"But more and more, there are students at the top who cheat to thrive.† Internet access has made cheating easier, enabling students to connect instantly with answers, friends to consult and works to plagiarize. And generations of research has shown that a major factor in unethical behavior is simply how easy or hard it is. A recent study by Jeffrey A. Roberts and David M. Wasieleski at Duquesne University found that the more online tools college students were allowed to use to complete an assignment, the more likely they were to copy the work of others. The Internet has changed attitudes, as a world of instant downloading, searching, cutting and pasting has loosened some ideas of ownership and authorship. An increased emphasis on having students work in teams may also have played a role. â€Å"Students are surprisingly unclear about what constitutes plagiarism or cheating,† said Mr. Wasieleski, an associate professor of management. Howard Gardner, a professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, said that over the 20 years he has studied professional and academic integrity, â€Å"the ethical muscles have atrophied,† in part because of a culture that exalts success, however it is attained. He said the attitude he has found among students at elite colleges is: â€Å"We want to be famous and successful, we think our colleagues are cutting corners, we’ll be damned if we’ll lose out to them, and some day, when we’ve made it, we’ll be role models. But until then, give us a pass.† Numerous projects and research studies have shown that frequently reinforcing standards, to both students and teachers, can lessen cheating. But experts say most schools fail to do so. â€Å"Institutions do a poor job of making those boundaries clear and consistent, of educating students about them, of enforcing them, and of giving teachers a clear process to follow through on them,† said Laurie L. Hazard, director of the Academic Center for Excellence at Bryant University. In the programs that colleges run to help new students make the transition from high school, students are counseled on everything from food to friendships, but â€Å"little or no time is spent on cheating,† she said. A 2010 survey of Yale undergraduates by The Yale Daily News showed that most had never read the school’s policy on academic honesty, and most were unsure of the rules on sharing or recycling their work. In surveys of high school students, the Josephson Institute of Ethics, which advises schools on ethics education, has found that about three-fifths admit to having cheated in the previous year — and about four-fifths say their own ethics are above average. Few schools â€Å"place any meaningful emphasis on integrity, academic or otherwise, and colleges are even more indifferent than high schools,† said Michael Josephson, president of the institute. â€Å"When you start giving take-home exams and telling kids not to talk about it, or you let them carry smartphones into tests, it’s an invitation to cheating,† he said. The case that Harvard revealed in late August involved a take-home final exam in an undergraduate course with 279 students. The university has not yet held hearings on the charges, which may take months to resolve. Officials said similarities in test papers suggested that nearly half the class had broken the rules against plagiarism and working together; some of the accused students said their behavior was innocent, or fell into gray areas. Mr. McCabe’s surveys, conducted around the country, have found that most college students see collaborating with others, even when it is forbidden, as a minor offense or no offense at all. Nearly half take the same view of paraphrasing or copying someone else’s work without attribution. And most high school teachers and college professors surveyed fail to pursue some of the violations they find. Experts say that along with students, schools and technology, parents are also to blame. They cite surveys, anecdotal impressions and the work of researchers like Jean M. Twenge, author of the book â€Å"Generation Me,† to make the case that since the 1960s, parenting has shifted away from emphasizing obedience, honor and respect for authority to promoting children’s happiness while stoking their ambitions for material success. â€Å"We have a culture now where we have real trouble accepting that our kids make mistakes and fail, and when they do, we tend to blame someone else,† said Tricia Bertram Gallant, author of â€Å"Creating the Ethical Academy,† and director of the academic integrity office at the University of California at San Diego. â€Å"Thirty, 40 years ago, the parent would come in and grab the kid by the ear, yell at him and drag him home.† Educators tell tales of students who grew up taking for granted not only that their highly involved parents would help with schoolwork but that the â€Å"help† would strain the definition of the word. Ms. Gallant recalled giving integrity counseling to a student who would send research papers to her mother to review before turning them in — and saw nothing wrong in that. One paper, it turned out, her mother had extensively rewritten — and extensively plagiarized. The Good News in the Atlanta and D.C. School Cheating Scandals With the possible exception of tot-murdering moms and professional basketball players who jilt their fans on live television, there is no more reviled figure in American life than Bernie Madoff. Portrayed on the cover of New York magazine in Heath-Ledger-as-Joker makeup, he has been variously described as a sociopath, a financial serial killer, and the devil incarnate. What nobody has said, however, is that Madoff was the victim of a profession that puts relentless pressure on money managers to publicly report their success in the market. And, while plenty of deserved scorn has been heaped on the auxiliary financial institutions and hapless federal regulators who allowed his fraud to unfold for decades, nobody has suggested that those lapses in any way mitigate Madoff’s culpability in his crimes. Society has taken away all of Madoff’s money and freedom, but it has left him with one thing: the dignity inheren t in possessing moral responsibility for doing wrong. It has been less respectful, unfortunately, to educators in our public schools. Recent weeks have seen reports of a terrible cheating scandal in Atlanta; a Georgia state investigation implicated scores of teachers and principals of systematically falsifying student test scores. Earlier this year, USA Today revealed evidence of test score manipulation in the District of Columbia. Similar scandals have erupted over the years in Houston, Oakland, Dallas, Chicago, and elsewhere, all tied to the pressure educators feel to show evidence of student learning on standardized tests. And, every time news of cheating breaks, opponents of standardized testing and accountability in public education have been quick to deflect blame from morally challenged educators and aim it toward the tests themselves. When asked about Atlanta, noted school reform apostate Diane Ravitch pointed the finger at the federal No Child Left Behind law, saying that, when high-stakes incentives are attached to test scores, we are â€Å"virtually inviting† teachers to cheat. At the Daily Kos, r eaders were told that â€Å"the tests, and the stakes attached to them, are the issue. No rational person can look at cheating this widespread and decide its existence is about the individuals, however blameworthy their behavior may be.† One Atlanta-area teacher put it this way: â€Å"Anybody whose job is tied to performance, it is a setup.† In search of a theory to back up these assertions, testing opponents often invoke â€Å"Campbell’s Law,† an adage put forth in the 1970s by social scientist Donald Campbell. It holds that â€Å"[t]he more any quantitative social indicator [e.g. standardized testing] is used for social decision-making, the more subject it will be to corruption pressures.† As a way of understanding education policy, or anything else, Campbell’s Law is both inaccurate and banal. In reality, most people are quite adept at resisting corruption pressure, which is why the vast majority of teachers whose students take standardized tests do not cheat. And, while some do, the fallibility of humankind has been known for a long time. So I hereby coin Carey’s Law, which holds that trite observations are more likely to be regarded as sacred principles if someone happen s to describe them as laws. TO BE SURE, people (and teachers) will succumb to dishonesty. They cheat on their taxes, spouses, and golf partners. Cheating corrodes trust in all things, especially education. Students whose test scores are manipulated upward don’t the get the extra attention they need. And, since teachers are increasingly being evaluated by how much their students’ test scores improve, a teacher who inflates scores could potentially cost her colleagues in the next grade of their job performance. But cheating also means that public schools finally care enough about student performance that some ethically challenged educators have chosen to cheat. This is far better than the alternative, where learning is so incidental and non-transparent that people of low character can’t be bothered to lie about it. Blaming cheating on the test amounts to infantilizing teachers, moving teaching 180 degrees away from the kind of professionalization that teacher advocates often profess to support. Instead of doing away with the pressures of a performance-based system, the best way to combat cheating is by buil ding institutions that have systems and organizational cultures that minimize the amount of corruption and abuse that occurs. This is harder to do in some places than in others. The District of Columbia, for example, is not exactly a bastion of civic virtue. Half the members of our city council currently stand accused of some form of misconduct, including council president Kwame Brown, who is being investigated by the U.S. Attorney for matters regarding the use of hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign funds. Nobody, by the way, is blaming the corruption pressures inherent to our vote-intensive election system for Brown’s alleged misdeeds. Indeed, it’s not a coincidence that cheating scandals tend to erupt in municipalities whose public institutions suffer from corruption. But, when the Atlanta police department was rocked by accusations that officers falsified warrants, planted evidence, and gunned down a 92-year old woman in a botched drug raid, national commentators didn’t pin the blame on a system that holds police departments accountable for solving crimes. Corruption, educat ional or otherwise, should be fought with strong law enforcement, the election of public officials with integrity, and the vigilance of citizen’s groups and a watchful press. The Securities and Exchange Commission exists because lawmakers correctly assume that the pressures and temptations of making money are so great that companies and financial actors can’t be trusted. Other than lunatic objectivistsand Wall Street water-carriers, nobody reacted to Madoff, Enron, or WorldCom by calling for less enforcement and public reporting of information. Instead, they rightly called for more. Finally, we should never forget that cheating in public education long predates the advent of standardized testing and accountability. Back then, it happened in the form of students who were ill-taught and passed along through grades until they were handed a diploma despite their inability to read, write, work with numbers, or otherwise perform any of the skills and tasks necessary to make a decent life in the modern world. Often, their children were sent back into the very same dysfunctional systems to begin the cycle anew. The only difference was, that kind of cheating didn’t result in state investigations, newspapers headlines, and calls for the responsible parties to be thrown in jail. The new way we structure testing and reward and punish people for their actions with regard to that testing is better for students—and even teachers—in the long run. Kevin Carey is the policy director of Education Sector, a think tank in Washington, D.C. Cheating is Cheating is Cheating. MANILA, Philippines — DEAR CHICO AND DELAMAR†¦I do a little tutoring on the side to earn some extra money while in college, and I’ve become friends with most of my students as they are mostly just a few years younger than I am. We often still communicate with each other even after I’ve stopped tutoring them. One of the guys that I’ve become close to has recently come to me and tearfully confided that he cheated in an exam and ended up winning an award because of it. I was very disappointed by what he did, because he’s a very smart kid and has a generally sterling academic record. He says that he only did it because his family was going to a really rough patch and he didn’t want an academic failure to compound their problems. He certainly seems guilty over it, and has promised me to never do it again because it wasn’t worth the guilt. What I’m torn about is whether I should tell the school about it. I feel bad about what heà ¢â‚¬â„¢s done, but telling the school would possibly ruin his reputation and his chances at getting into a great college. Should I just let it go and trust that he won’t do it again? -Leonard CHICO SAYS†¦I must admit, this is a tough one. It’s the classic choice between doing the kind thing and doing the right thing. I can’t tell you what is the right thing to do, but what I can do is tell you is what I’d do. I don’t know if I’d have the heart to turn him in. Even if I knew that on paper it’s the right thing to do, I don’t know if I’d muster the resolve. If you can’t choose between the two, you can always try and convince him to do the right thing for himself. Besides, it’s his misdeed that’s causing all this guilt, so he is the best person to right this particular wrong. I’m sure most people would be like, what’s the big deal? He’s learned his lesson, and everybody cheats every now and then, so why ruin a promising future? But remember, somebody who deserved that award was robbed of it. No matter how big or small the accolade, someone else deserved to get that award. And if a young mind gets the idea that he can get away with robbing someone of something as long as he doesn’t get caught, then who is to say that it will stop here? Who is to say that some of the crooked people in high places didn’t get their start with petty â€Å"crimes† like cheating in exams? Leave this sliding doors moment for him to decide. He can opt to leave things as they are and move on, or he can step up to the plate and right the wrong with his own hands, the very hands that caused the injustice in the first place. If he thinks the right thing for him to do is to own up to the cheating, then there is no other recourse but to bite the bullet and confess, just like if you feel it is your duty to report him, then you are beholden to yourself to do so. For all you know, him confessing may be a bitch to handle now, but it could also be the best thing that ever happened to him. Character is hard to come by these days. Something like this could actually build him some. Do what feels right to you at this moment; in difficult situations like these, it’s the best you can do. DELAMAR SAYS†¦There is no way you can be sure he won’t do it again. There is no way that you can be sure that the next time a similar situation happens he won’t take the easy way of cheating again. In his mind he might justify cheating as long as he can say he did it for his family. And did he really do it just to not add on to his family problems? And would it really have added to his family’s problems? Isn’t it understandable that when families go through problems children’s school work do suffer? Did he really do it for family? Or, did he do it for himself? If there was a way to make sure this really was a one time and only a one time thing, most people will say why not let it pass without consequence? But that’s the thing, there is no way you can tell. And the one thing that needs to be considered more than just whether he will do it again or not is this — him cheating earned him an award. Which means: his cheating deprived someone of an award that would have been legitimately earned. He took it from somebody else who would have rightly earned it. And in my opinion, that is certainly not fair. I think this problem is a question of being understanding to someone who was just really pushed to the edge or do you consider this as a great opportunity to learn a very hard lesson too. The lesson that cheating is cheating is cheating. No matter what your justification is it is still a wrong that has consequences. The consequence that is so great, at the cost of his good reputation being tarnished and risking his entrance to a good college, that he will never cheat again. Cheating can destroy all your previous honest efforts. That is a great lesson he will never forget. And also he has to learn that his cheating deprived someone of that award. And these things if he has to pay the consequence will surely send a message that cheating isn’t worth it. He will learn that he just has to live with not performing well when his family is going through something rather than to automatically cheat. Your decision lies with how well you know your student. Will this serve as a lesson he will never forget and never do again? Or, is this his chance to learn at this point and painfully that there are consequences to the actions we do? What can your conscience live with? Whatever you decide I just hope the person who might have been deprived of that award the student earned with his cheating efforts will still get what he deserves. Maybe you can figure out a way to punish the act of cheating but at the same time give him some leeway because he did come forward to admit his wrongdoing? In my opinion the best way is to show him that this act cannot go without consequence, some consequence. You can argue on his behalf that the punishment be less severe so as not to risk his college entrance but he certainly has to understand that he cannot get away with cheating without paying the price. Trick or Cheat. Cheat. It’s probably something that we’ve done at least once in our academic life. Whether through hidden answer sheets, information shared with friends from different sections, or just taking a peek at a seatmate’s paper, not very many of us can claim to be innocent in this regard. Penelope (not her real name) a college senior at a school in Manila’s University Belt, admits to be cheating in exams since she was in fourth year high school. â€Å"I needed to,† she justifies. â€Å"We had to memorize the formulas in our Physics class and we weren’t allowed to have an index card to look at. I was a candidate to become an outstanding student at the time and I didn’t want to fail that exam.† Aside from looking at her seatmate’s paper, she also had a small paper with all the needed formulas hidden in her socks. Penelope has never been caught, but on the occasion that she is, she says she plans to apologize to the teacher. â€Å"But t hat doesn’t mean I’ll stop. I believe cheating is one of the elements of being a student,† she says. Penelope’s story is something that is replicated in the lives of other students across the city. Just like Penelope, Nicole (not her real name) began cheating in exams in high school, mainly because everyone else in her class was doing it. â€Å"It wasn’t intentional at first. The examiner was out of the room, and I took the liberty to check my notes in Biology and compare if my answers were correct. I found it really rewarding to get a perfect score,† she recalls. But unlike Penelope, Nicole was unlucky enough to get caught. â€Å"I decided not to do it anymore and try to rely on my full capacity to answer all subsequent tests,† she says. However, â€Å"try† is the important word in Nicole’s statement. When asked if getting caught stopped her from cheating, her reply is short and direct to the point: â€Å"Not really.† MODERN CHEATING The temptation to cheat is even easier for today’s technologically-advanced youth. With mobile phones making the transmission of messages easier and the Internet making the sharing of information much quicker, today’s Filipino student can just as easily download his answers from a computer as he can from looking at his seatmate’s answers. However, it would seem that the tried and tested technique of looking at the answer of seatmates, passing around notes, and â€Å"reliable† classmates are the methods preferred by today’s young Filipinos. â€Å"If you give people answers, they give you answers back,† says Elle (not her real name). â€Å"My two friends and I would form a triangle with our seats — we call it the Triangle Offense. It gave us good angles. I also ask people who’ve taken the tests earlier for questions and answers.† Mark (not his real name) also relied on his classmates to get a higher grade than the one he would have otherwise received on his tests. â€Å"Back in high school, teachers would have us exchange papers with our fellow classmates and we would have to honestly mark each others tests. It wasn’t me who changed the answers, but my seatmate who’s marking it. That’s what made it possible,† he says. Just like Nicole, Elle has already been caught cheating. And just like Nicole, Elle says this hasn’t stopped her from cheating. â€Å"I’ve been caught, and I just made pa-cute and joked around. I charmed the teacher,† she says. â€Å"Getting caught didn’t stop me from cheating. It empowered me even more.† CHEAT BUSTERS If cheating seems unavoidable, what can school administrations do? Preventing behavior like this from occurring in the first place seems to be the approach being taken by educational institutions. The De La Salle University, for instance, has a Discipline Office (DO), which promotes students discipline, maintains peace, order and cleanliness in the University, and seeks to prevent, rather than correct, unseemly student behavior. Nimpha Baldeo, the DO head, says that her office conducts regular seminars and lectures on values for teachers, parents, and students, and comes out with publications on these topics such as modules, a DO Guide, and a DO Bulletin. â€Å"Discipline awareness is also celebrated every October by the academic community with exhibits and forums to intensify the information drive on University policies, rules and regulations,† she says. â€Å"The University also recently established the Compliance Office to ensure that all significant requirements necessary for compliance with law, regulation, or other binding rules in and outside the University are in place.† Students who are caught cheating are not immediately suspended or expelled, rather, they are put under probation and exposed to a series of seminars and related activities on values formation and clarification. DLSU also curbs plagiarism and protects intellectual rights. Academic papers have to cite its sources, whether from open source references like Wikipedia or from traditional materials, and written permission from concerned faculty members are required if a student intends to submit the same work to another course for extra credit. A MATTER OF TRUST Alexandra (not her real name), a literature professor for two years at a prominent university in Quezon City, has a much more personal view of how to stop cheating among the student body. Alexandra says that in her short years of teaching, she has not yet encountered a case of cheating in her class. While part of this is because most of her examinations are essay-based, she also says that this is because she trusts that her students know better than to cheat. â€Å"When I give objective tests, I don’t patrol. You could say I don’t even really check,† she reveals. â€Å"I feel it’s a very obvious sign of not trusting them. These kids are in college. it’s no longer high school or grade school. What they do with their education is their business. I’m there to guide and instruct, but I’m not there to be their mother. Show them that you trust them somehow, and hopefully, they’ll live up to it.† Alexandra says that rather than looking to change how students behave, educators should instead look into themselves and find out if they are the ones contributing to the problem. â€Å"I think cheating can be curbed, because I honestly think that students cheat if they feel that it’s impossible,† she says. â€Å"And impossibility is a result of demanding too much output when you haven’t even put much in to begin with. If you’re a good educator, students won’t feel the need to cheat.† ——————————————– [ 1 ]. New Republic, by Blaine Greteman, September 12, 2012 [ 2 ]. The New York Times, by Richard Perez-Peà ±a, September 7, 2012 [ 3 ]. New Republic, Kevin Carey, July 19, 2011 [ 4 ]. Manila Bulletin Publishing Corporation, Chico and Delamar, November 9, 2011 [ 5 ]. Manila Bulletin Publishing Corporation, Ronald S. Lim, November 12, 2009

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