So, since we had a two hour delay, I did not have time to assign the other class "What the Bagel Man Saw", so that will be the subject of this week's blog! Most of you have already read it. So here goes the blog assignment:
Read What the Bagel Man Saw . It is also in your text book, but here is a link also. Additionally, listen to Me and Julio Down by the School Yard . The gist of the song is that "Me and Julio" got caught doing something illegal and were sent to the clink. They got released after a radical priest argued for their innocence. Mama Pajama is the lady who turned them in. The video was filmed in Paul Simon's old neighborhood in Queens New York where he met his music partner Art Garfunkel.
So, make an argument for or against the use of an honor code at Elk County Catholic High School. You can reference the article and or the song. Put an * next to your thesis.
The honor code is a system at Elk County Catholic that discourages cheating and plagiarism. It prompts students to not cheat simply because it is wrong, even if there is no evidence or punishment. I think that the honor code is a perfect system to sway cheating and develop the morals and minds of students. *The honor code is a successful system because it mirrors real world situations, holds students responsible for their own actions, and is unanimous with Gods goodness.
ReplyDeleteIn "What the Bagel Man Saw", Paul F. Points out that workers at big companies have to have people watching them steal from him, yet the stealing continues. He comes to the conclusion that cheaters will always cheat. Regardless of regular detentions and other punishments, cheaters will still cheat. After these punishments, students will still graduate and go on to a place where they can cheat more comfortably. And what did they learn? While being part of the honor code, even if students cheat and get away with it, they learn something. They learn that they are cheaters.
The honor code holds students responsible for their own actions. In Paul's experiment, you either put the dollar in the box or you do not, and there is not in between. Even when Paul was standing there a man still tried to cheat. He made up an excuse for why he didn't put the dollar in the box and went on his way without his food. The cheater never actually committed the crime, but the fact that he tried to and couldn't without feeling any shame was worse.While it was only a few cents, it still stands that the act was wrong. When students cheat on a simple quiz they think that it is alright because the punishment reflects the "it's just a quiz" attitude. The act is still wrong. In this way the honor code rejects cheating of all types because it is wrong, showing students that you either cheat or you do not, and the punishment is irrelevant to it.
The honor code actually minimizes cheating. Paul F. and his statistics prove that humankind is generally honest. Giving people the benefit of the doubt and actually believing that they can be honest makes all the difference. When showed that they are respected, students generally act in a respectful way. Believing in the goodness and dignity of the human person without giving up hope that goodness will always prevail is concordant with belief in God's perfection. In believing God is all good, you believe that the people God created are also good and honest. The honor code is the best possible system to minimize cheating and to further develop the morals of students.
Catherine:
DeleteYou made some solid points. I think that honor systems are good things, that have been proved successful. One thing I disagree with is when you said "While being part of the honor code, even if students cheat and get away with it, they learn something. They learn that they are cheaters." I am not sure that they learned they are cheaters due to the honor system. If you cheat, you know you do, honor system or no honor system. You did a nice job of incorporating the story of the Bagel Man into your blog. Cheating is a big issue at our school, so maybe this could help.
Catherine,
DeleteI really enjoyed your blog. You provided some great points. However, in your last paragraph you stated that "Paul F and his statistics proved that humankind is generally honest," but from the story I rembered that his statistics proved that humankind is generally dishonest. I could have interpreted it incorrectly because there were several statistics in his story.
Catherine,
DeleteYour blog was really good, and I really like how you broke up the story about what the bagel man saw. Although I disagree that the honor system is the best for ECC.
Catherine,
DeleteYou had a very nice closed thesis, however, I think the word "compatible" would have been more fitting in that sentence instead of "unanimous." Just a thought. You did an outstanding job relating the anecdote from Paul F's synopsis to the mentality of "it's only a quiz." The concluding paragraph was good for the simple fact that it made sense of everything and reflected that human beings are innately good. We were created to be good.
The idea of implementing an honor system into Elk County Catholic High School continues to make me scratch my head. As a Catholic school, we value integrity and honesty, as we are called to be truthful men and women. In all honesty, I just do not see the honor system being successful in today’s world and in a small school like ours. *Creating an honor system at Elk County Catholic would be ineffective because the size of the school, the competitiveness, and God is already watching.
ReplyDeleteWith an average class size of roughly 17 students, an honor system could see problems with this. The Bagel Man story actually supports my stance, “in a bigger office, a bigger crowd is bound to convene around the bagel table -- providing more witnesses to make sure you drop your money in the box.” I currently am taking classes with a single digit number of students. How could this be a problem? Kids will be kids (I say this with all honesty, I am not supporting the “kids will be kids” stance) which will cause some kind of cheating. Just as in the Bagel Man story, people will be people, as they do not always pay for what they take, even though it might have been a small crime, it was wrong. In the story he considered companies ''honest'' if the payment for the bagels was 90 percent or more. That is the world we live in. In that class of 8 I am currently in, there is one female, the rest are male. For example, the honor system at ECC is now established and there is a test the mostly everyone in the class is struggling on. The boys start talking during the test. Are they going to tell on each other? Of course not, they have been friends forever, and they basically say to each other that if you guys do not tell on me I won’t tell on you. What about the girl? She is required to go tell. Will she? This puts the girl in a very tough situation. It is easy for us to say, “Oh that is so easy, all she has to do is go tell then the boys will get kicked out of the school!” Is it really THAT easy? No. Although telling is the right thing to do, it is difficult because the boys in the class would know that it was her. Now everyone knows this girl got all those boys in trouble which could set up further issues. I understand that this example is slightly harsh, but it isn’t farfetched. The possibility of this happening is higher at Elk County Catholic because of the small class sizes, than most other places.
Honor systems tend to be used in colleges rather than high schools. I believe a significant reason for this, is the competitive nature of college. In college there are kids competing just to make it into, for example, the next step of the nursing school. In high school, there is not a much competitiveness. Yes, class rank and honor roles are things of competition, but since we have been told for the past 2 years that those things do not matter, there is little to be competitive about. Honor systems seem to be more suitable at the college level.
In a Catholic school, an honor system should work, right? I am not sure that everyone would follow. Lets put everything aside and think to ourselves what really matters. What is more important, a good grade or the opportunity to get to heaven? A 4.0 or sainthood? Having an honor system or not, the responsibility is on ourselves to do the right thing. Sometimes cheaters might get by, and some will say “cheaters can win.” They might have won on earth, but did they win in heaven? We are called to have the courage to stand up to evil and the temptation of cheating and do what is right, if your teacher is in or out of the room, because someone is watching regardless.
Gaber,
DeleteDespite the fact that we disagree on the overall honor code, your argument was very well done and organized. I noticed your closed thesis and how the first paragraph consisted of a relatable anecdote. I don't agree with your statement of how class rank does not matter, because it definitely does to some extent. At the college fair, most of the colleges I talked to included class rank as part of what they look for on résumés. Your concluding paragraph is eloquent and beautiful ! I always love reading your writing on matters of morals and Catholicism. I think you could end up being a wonderful Catholic author.
Gabe,
ReplyDeleteYour argument is very well conducted and you make two great points that I totally agree with. However, I do not agree with you in saying that the amount of competitiveness affects the honor system. If the honor system were working correctly, the reason for bringing cheaters to justice would not be to put yourself ahead. Also, you say that competitiveness is not high at Elk County Catholic, which I disagree with. We are constantly told that we should strive to be the best by social media, pressure from peers and parents, and in books and songs. All of these things make one very competitive, like it or not.
ECCSS should not adopt a honor system policy for a main reason, it is not that it would not be effective. I believe that it would stop he rampant cheating at is an everyday occurrence in almost every class. It would put an end to it and make everyone responsible for their own work and grades. It would be detrimental to the school, because if we followed the honor system of the navy academy then most of our school body would be expelled and our school would go out of business do to lack of student body. In the What The Bagel Man Saw he discovered that many people will always be cheaters and nothing will change that. This mean that the cheaters that are already in the school they will always be cheaters and by implementing this honor system many of the cheater who will not change will be expelled. What The Bagel Man Saw also showed the things like day of the week and weather can effect how people decide to cheat. The study also showed that the majority of people are actually generally good, but from my firsthand experience that the rampant cheating that occurs all the time. It can show that most of the people in our school do not take cheating seriously, and do not really care about the consequences. I fell that most people will not take the honor policy seriously and it will not have the effect that it should have. *The honor policy will not have the effect that it is attested to have and will cause many students to be expelled, and this would lead to a dramatic loss of student body.
ReplyDeleteMitchell,
DeleteYou did present a good point in your blog, but in all honesty I find that losing most of the student body is a bit too drastic. You said yourself that you believed an honor policy would stop rampant cheating issues. So why would we lose most of our student body if the these problems stopped? I feel like you just contradicted yourself a little and your blog could use a little more clarification. However, you did a great job overall.
Mitchell,
DeleteI think it is a hasty generalization to say that more students will get expelled from the school with the honor policy. In "What the Bagel Man Saw," there was actually a pretty great percentage of honest people. The honor code is not only about catching misconduct, but preventing the crime in the first place. I agree with Hailee that you were just a bit too drastic by saying we would lose all of our student body because we have a great deal of honest and well-behaved students.
Mitchell:
DeleteI understand your point. I think you did contradict yourself, as stated above, because you said that the honor system would stop cheating, but then you go on to say we will lose a lot of students due to cheating. Which one is it? I think that you made some grammatical errors that made this a bit hard to read at times, so just a helpful hint, remember to check over your work.
Mitchell,
DeleteI completely agree that it would be detrimental to our school system if we incorporated the honor system into ECC. One thing in your blog you said I wish I would have made more of an emphasis on is that the honor system could be effective, just not in our school.
Elk County Catholic's honor code is a great policy that prompts students to not cheat and earn their grade with the amount of work and effort they put into their school career. The honor code gives students the chance to decide for themselves whether or not they should do the right thing, even if no one can prove that their actions were wrong. *Honor policies work to create fair treatment between everyone and promotes good, conscious decisions in many types of common problems and temptations.
ReplyDeleteMany people first discover the honor code in school. Most honor codes in school systems ban cheating, plagiarism, etc. Students may still be able to find loop holes and work around cheating, but with an honor policy in place it removes several areas of these problems, and continues to work in favor of each student that follows the honor code. By using an honor policy in school, students also learn the difference between right and wrong, and are able to make better decisions in many different scenarios. By establishing an honor code in school systems like ECC, students may be more likely to give the money for their bagel, like in the story, "What the Bagel Man Saw." Honor policies establish a strong, moral conscience that will stay with students throughout their lives and in all of their decisions.
An honor system would be greatly beneficial to each student at ECC. In my opinion, I believe that every school should establish an honor code because it will improve each student's honesty in all scenarios. The use of an honor policy will help to remove cheating and create a better lifestyle for all students that learn and abide by it.
Hailee,
DeleteYou did a good job of arguing for the honor code. I agree that it allows the students further chance to determine the morality of their actions. There were a few sentences towards the end of your body paragraph that were a bit unclear to me though. I would have liked more explanation on how an honor code makes students more willing to pay more money for their bagel. Surely that isn't a literal bagel, right? In addition, I think your blog would have benefitted if you had added examples of how students learn right from wrong and how to make better decisions in different situations. I think that statement was just a bit ambiguous, but overall, great job!
Hailee,
DeleteThe points you made throughout your blog were valid and well thought out. Although, you said that the honor policy helps students make better decisions for the next time. I disagree with that because I know from experience that people who have cheated will continue to cheat. Your argument is good, but I don't think an honor system would work at ECC.
Honor codes have been said to create more trouble than they prevent because they rely on people's honesty. From such reasoning, it seems that many people have forgotten the existence of honest citizens. The use of an honor code at Elk County Catholic High School exhibits a variety of benefits. *The honor code's reliance on the innate goodness of people is not naïve, but rather a logical method of creating a wholesome and trusting environment for teaching and learning.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of complete honesty from every person is a utopian one. As Paul F's calculations attest, there will be dishonest people no matter the circumstances. However, the honor code is designed to encourage honesty in already honest people. It doesn't deny that there are dishonest people but places faith in honesty. It may convert dishonest people, and it may not, but it's better than a system of solely punishment. A system based on punishment has no affect on some people, but the idea that a person trusts and respects them as an honest person can. Instead of encouraging good behavior with only fear and belittlement, the honor code builds participants up with values that benefit the recipient. At ECC specifically, Catholic values such as love, trust, and atonement for sins strengthen ideas of honesty. A trust system between students and teachers is a vital part of building an honest student body. The honor code more effectively discourages undesirable behaviors by allowing students to be good before they are determined to be bad.
The honor code also provides a method of catching dishonest people. Any person taking part in the honor code is obligated to report any misconduct by their peers. The system is effective in that endeavor because it relies on the honest to be honest. Wrongdoers that refuse to abide by rules can be caught and appropriately disciplined through that method. Some students will stand by their peers, but as reported by Paul F., he has had a staggering 89 percent rate of honesty. People can surprise you, and without faith in something good, what are we living for? Sometimes, we need to turn to the good of the world to change the bad.
Jenna,
DeleteI think your blog was good, but I noticed that you said it relied on honest people, but the issue in ECC is not the honest people. It is the cheaters who are the issue, and the honor system will just make the school system lose more kids that they can not afford to lose. The lack of students is the reason why we are forced to combine the middle and high school.
The thought of having an honor code at our school originally gave me a sense of possibility. Knowing first hand that our school has trouble with cheating, I realized this could give our school the push it needed to start erasing this issue. Then I began thinking more and more about how it would work. I came to a conclusion that it wouldn't work, not at ECC. Personally, I wish it would work, but I know to well that it wouldn't. *The use of an honor system at Elk County Catholic would not be effective due to the size of our school, inability to rat out classmates, and the lack of character in students.
ReplyDeleteFirst off, ECC has very small numbers. Each year it seems as if class sizes are continuing to decrease more and more. If we enforced the honor code by saying "anyone seen cheating will be expelled, and the person who saw the individual cheating must report it or he or she will also be expelled from school" our school would never make it. Especially in a small setting, it would be easier to cheat because there are not as many witnesses around. It is common sense to understand that if more people were in the room, it would be more difficult to cheat due to the increasing amount of witnesses. Especially at ECC, I know in small class sized rooms people would cheat without issue. By being in the classes at ECC, I know just how convenient and easy it would be to get together with a group of friends and cheat without anyone ratting each other out. Just like in What the Bagel Man Saw, it states that "in a bigger office, a bigger crowd is bound to convene around the bagel table—providing more witnesses to make sure you drop your money in the box." I know for a fact many of us would not rat out friends. If one of my friends whispered to me asking for an answer, I know I would not turn them in. In all honesty, I'm sure all of us can say we cheated in some shape or form once in our lives. Some of us may feel guilty about it, but I know many of the students don't care at all. They don't care about the guilt, they will do anything to get answers to a test or homework. They will go to extreme lengths to make sure they don't have to do any work. In my eyes, cheating becomes a habit. If you know you can retrieve the answers online, we may ask ourselves why do the work? In the end, it all comes down to our integrity. What do you do when no one else is looking? Realistically, I don't see the honor system working in our school. I would like to think many of us genuinely work hard for our grades, but in reality I do not see that being the case in our school system.
Brad,
DeleteYour thesis was great, but you failed to support your claims well. I am not sure that you mentioned some in the rest of your blog at all, and the ones that you did present seemed rushed. Also, the quote you used about the bagels being stolen less in a big place because there are more witnesses isn't true. That was his theory, but it never proved to be true, and in small places and big places alike the rate of cheating differed. Your ideas are good, just take the time to defend them.
As I read various blog posts, some of which were from the other class, I started to gain an insight as to how students feel about incorporating an honor system. For the most part, a lot of students are all for it, and it is hard to blame them. Cheating, despite the fact that we attend a Catholic school centered on core values, continues to be a rampant occurrence. Paul F.'s data and observations in his bagel business can explain this. His synopsis tells us that there will always be cheaters and wrongdoers because it is an act that entails both the easy route and the selfish route. However, human beings are innately good. We were created to be good.
ReplyDeleteThe Elk County Catholic Schools did implement a cheating/plagiarism policy a few years ago with failure for the quarter as a consequence, but rarely is it ever enforced; it is not easy to enforce. For example, I know a classmate who repeatedly plagiarized while writing research papers but the harshest punishment consisted of a verbal lecture, maybe a detention at the most. I believe this is indicative of the idea that students need to feel more accountable and more responsible for their actions, because it is evident that excessive repercussions are rarely ever appointed. With an honor code in effect, I truly think that students will strive to do whatever it takes to be young men and women of integrity. Why? Well, I guarantee no one wants to be publicly labeled as a cheater.
I would like to end on this note. The hardest part of the honor system would undoubtedly be that students must have the courage to report fellow classmates if they have any knowledge of misconduct. It is obviously easier said than done. Nevertheless, I believe it is something we are capable of. I myself would not be ashamed to turn in classmates for cheating because it is not right for them to have the same grade for something they didn't do. Anyways, don't we have frames around the school building saying, "Sometimes the hardest thing and the right thing are the same" ? If Mrs. Messineo claims that cheating is widespread, obviously our current policies are not as effective as they need to be. As a school community, we have to do something. We cannot stand by and allow it to keep happening. Even if adjustments need to be made to the honor code after it is approved, so be it. It is better than nothing. As Theodore Roosevelt once said, "In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing."
Thesis:
ReplyDeleteThe implementation of an honor code is the first step that Elk County Catholic must take to show that it does not constitute a group of passive bystanders, but rather it represents a righteous institution committed to academic excellence.