Newspapers / Daily Tar Heel (Chapel … / Sept. 30, 1982, edition 1 / Page 8
Part of Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.) / About this page
This page has errors
The date, title, or page description is wrong
This page has harmful content
This page contains sensitive or offensive material
8The Daily Tar HeelThursday, September 30, 1932 mm mml FAA probe incomplete 90i .year of editorial freedom John Drescher. ANN PETERS, Afow wr KERRY DE ROCHI, Associate Editor Rachel Perry, university Edit Alan Chapple, aty Editor JIM WR1NN, Stale and National Editor Linda Robertson. Sports Editor Laura Seifert, nw Efiwr KEN MlNGIS. Associate Editor Elaine McClatchey, paa Editor SUSAN HUDSON, Features Editor LEAH T ALLEY, Arts Editor Teresa Curry, Weekend Editor AL STEELE, Photography Editor Part-time teaching In an article last week in this paper titled "Research abilities empha sized in hiring professors," one student said, "I guess I know why pro fessors are called 'professors' in college rather than 'teacher.' It's because some of them really can't teach." The student's words point to the dilemma inherent in any academic in stitution, and one that's prevalent at UNC. Where should the line be drawn between the importance of a professor's role as a researcher and his job as an instructor? What is the. University's responsibility in en suring that top quality classroom experience is maintained at all times? The University has a fine academic reputation, but it is one owed most ly to research. Departments are ranked not by the quality of teaching, but rather by the quality of their research in a certain field. Professors are not hired unless they have impressive research background. In the letters to the editor today, one writer calls for professors to recognize the importance of both teaching and research. The author is the director of the Instructional Development division of the Media and In structional Support Center on campus. Workers there and in the Faculty Development division are concerned with improving a professor's class room ability. They provide evaluation and subsequent guidance to any professor seeking their help. Few professors have been seeking help with their teaching skills. Last year, only 1 1 professors sought help from the faculty development office. The reasons vary. Many professors still rank teaching as secondary to re search. And many believe that when they receive their Ph.D. they auto matically become good teachers. These attitudes are difficult to change. But they are the ones providing the greatest danger to education at the University. Deans, directors and department heads should emphasize the importance of teaching and take steps to ensure that the quality of classroom learning is maintained. One way would be through the adoption of a mandatory student evaluation of professors, to be given every semester. Through active student criticism and renewed administration encouragement, a professor would feel more inclined to worry about his classroom performance. Administrators, however, also must change their focus in hiring pro fessors. A new applicant for a job should be evaluated equally on his teaching ability. Some departments have gauged a teacher's classroom performance by a presentation of research to other faculty members. This is not adequate. Prospective professors should be judged while teaching a UNC class when invited for an interview. At a major university 5iich as UNC, research and teaching should play equal roles. Already, the University hap a fine research reputation. Ad ministrators and "professors should begin stressing the importance of teaching. No one expects stellar classroom entertainment. But neither should one have to settle for what amounts to part-time instructors. Blowing smoke 'Warninz: Gzarette . Smoking causes LUNG CANCER and EM PHYSEMA, is a major cause of HEART DISEASE, is ADDICTIVE and may result in DEATH. " If North Carolina Sen. John East has his way, that warning will never appear on cigarette packs. East and representatives of the state's tobacco industry have been fighting a bill recently approved by a House of Representatives subcommittee that would place new, explicit warnings on all packs of cigarettes. So far, they have been successful; no vote on the legislation is expected before Congress recesses in October. But it is a bill that should be passed when the new Congress convenes next January. Those opposed to the bill claim that it would do little good, that people already know about the dangers of cigarette smoking 'and that most smokers already ignore the warning on cigarette packs. But, that is why new, sterner labels are needed: Hie warning now on cigarette packs has been so overused that it has lost all meaning. If East really believes most smokers ignore the cigarette warnings, he should have no objection to the new labels. The proposed legislation, passed by the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee, would add at least three new warnings on cigarette packs. One would warn pregnant women of the hazards of smoking; another would say "QUITTING NOW greatly reduces the risks to your health." Another possibility, also hotly opposed by tobacco companies, would re quire cigarette manufacturers to list all chemicals found in cigarette smoke. ; Obviously many smokers are not going to stop smoking merely because of a new danger warning on a pack of cigarettes. But by more fully informing smokers of the specific hazards of their habit, some might be discouraged from continued puffing. Warning a pregnant mother that smoking may cause a miscarriage or premature birth would at least force her to stop and think about the risks to her unborn child. Congress would be doing the public a disfavor by rejecting this small but significant at tempt to help smokers kick the habit. The Bottom Line .Unlucky 13 Superstitious? Before its number was changed, Pampa, Texas, police patrol car D-13 meant just one thing to local officials: bad news. D-13 looked just like any other of the six , Chevrolet Impalas that went into service in July 1980. But unlike the other cars, D-13 was was involved in five accidents in 20 months. The other cars were accident free. .,.'.'..' Maybe it was all coincidence, but after a while, many officers began to believe in the superstition about unlucky no. 13 and Police chief J.J. Ryzman decided it was time to change the number on the battered car. . "The rxor car has been damaged in front, on the back, on the sides, just about everywhere except on top," ' Ryzman said. The accidents cost more than $8,000 in repairs. The last accident on April 1 , cost $2,500, and Ryzman said it was time to change things. Three days later, he ordered the , new number and D-25 has had a flawless safety record ever since. Naughty boys ' '". Everyone remembers getting caught at least once with their hand in the cookie jar. Well, some kids never grow up; they just graduate to bigger cookie jars. It seems kindergarten instructor in Baton Rouge, La., had to use her best "school teacher voice" to order two would-be burglars out of her home after she walked in and found them looting the place. The two men eventually left, but only after Linda McDaniel moved her car so they could make a getaway. "I guessed I used my best school teacher voice," she said later k 0 One of .them told her they couldn't leave because her car blocked theirs. She walked outside and calmly moved hers and they left without any loot. And that's the bottom line. By LEILA DUNBAR On Sept. 13, 1982, Juan Perez, cap tain of a DC-10 Spantax airliner, started his takeoff from Malaga, Spain. Sixty feet up in the air, he felt vibrations from the cockpit. He decided to abort the takeoff, he said later, because "I had to choose between trying to fly, knowing that we all might die, and trying to keep the plane on the ground, to save lives." Out of the 393 people aboard, more than 50 were killed. Preliminary investigations cited an engine failure as the cause of the acci dent, but research continues. One of the engines was found in a field far from the crash site. One question remains: what will the Federal Aviation Administration do once it receives its findings? If it follows prece dent, the FAA will require more str ingent maintenance and inspection codes, since a serious accident has occur red. The entire history of the McDonnell Douglas DC-10 is a good example of the FAA locking the barn door after the horse is let loose. The DC-10 was put on the market in 1970, two weeks ahead of Lockhee's L-1011. In the late 1960s, Boeing had cornered the intercontinental market, and Lockheed and McDonnell Douglas were competing to produce a smaller, short-range jet. But critics said that the plane had many defects, including the layout of its control lines, backup systems and its electronic-locking cargo door. In the first ground tests, the cargo door blew open, crushing the cabin floor. In 1972, a door popped open on a flight over Windsor, Ontario, and part of the cabin floor col lapsed. The pilot was able to make an emergency landing without injuries. After this incident, the FAA made a "gentlemen's agreement" with McDon nell Douglas to voluntarily modify the door. The company was still redesigning the door when a Turkish Airlines DC-10 crashed, in 1974, near Paris, France, kill- remaining DC-10s and inspected their engines. But of the 135 grounded, most were flying again in two or three days. When the FAA checked through their files, it found 52 previous reports of cracks in the engine mountings. The DC-10 has a history of mechanical problems. In 12 years, there have been many instances where engine parts have broken, caught fire, or fallen off. In 1974, a Congressional investiga tion charged that the first FAA tests on The FAA made a "gentleman's agreement" with McDonnell Douglas to modify the door voluntarily. The company was still redesigning the door when a Turkish Airline's DC-10 crashed near Paris, killing 346 people. ing 346 people. However, it was four more years before all the modifications were finished. After the French disaster, a U.S. House special subcommittee charged'that the FAA's actions showed "sluggishness which at times... ap proaches . . .indifference to public safety." Another example is the 1979 crash of an American Airlines DC-10 outside of Chicago. On takeoff, one of the left engines tore off the side of the jet. The pilot tried to control the airplane, but ap parently the backup hydraulic systems were damaged by the fallen engine. It crashed 1.5 miles outside of O'Hare In ternational Airport, killing 274 people. After the National Transportation Safety Board inspected the debris, it found that the parts attaching the engine to the wing had broken, causing it to fall off. The FAA immediately grounded the the engines in 1970 were incomplete and incorrectly based on specifications of older engines. After the 1979 Chicago crash, the FAA, at the suggestion of the NTSB, made recommendations to improve maintenance, manufacturing, and design. Another example is the Boeing 737. On Jan. 13, 1981, an Air Florida Boeing 737 crashed shortly after takeoff from Washington National Airport, into the 14th Street bridge, and then into the Potomac River, killing the pilots, 72 passengers, and four motorists. The results of an investigation showed that it had been 45 minutes since the airplane had been swabbed with de-icing chemicals; The buildup of ice and snow was probably the cause of the crash, since it increases the 'drag on the airplane and decreases lift, making it difficult to climb. But the NTSB said that the de-icing and anti-icing procedures were in adequate. On the strength of this report, the FAA issued an operations bulletin in 1981 requesting that operators review their de-icing procedurs, but did no more. It was also found that a great number of takeoffs were aborted by pilots of Boeing 737 aircraft because the anti-ice systems, when in use, show whether engine power is high enough for takeoff. If the anti-ice system is not used, indicators will show that engine power is higher than it actually is. Those anti-ice systems were turned off in the Air Florida 737 that crashed in Washington. Only then did the FAA make more str ingent recommendations to the air car riers. In comparison with the number of automobile crashes in the United States, aviation, including commercial airlines, is very safe. But it is very possible to en sure that margin of safety before ac cidents occur. The FAA's method has been to wait for the accident that spurs investigation and then enact new, more stringent rules. Rules that should have been extant in the first place. Perhaps, because of the Span ' tax DC-10 crash, the FAA will decide to crack down and make hard, fast rules,in stead of issuing requests and enacting "gentlemen's agreements." ' Leila Dunbar, a senior journalism and Spanish major from Milford, Mass., is assistant managing editor for The Daily Tar Heel. UNC needs teaching and research To the editor: How . is "teaching" perceived in a "research" university ("Research abilities emphasized in hiring professors," DTH, Sept. 22)? "Good researchers are good teachers": The "research" itself does not support this contention. Of the studies which have been done, some indicate a tenuous positive relationship between research and teaching, some a tenuous negative rela tionship. The definitive verdict is still out. When one reverts to personal experience, I, for one, have found at both the graduate and undergraduate levels, in this and other universities, great teachers who had great, good, and poor research records, and terrible teachers who had great, good, and poor research records. From my experience, the relationship is questionable, especially at the undergraduate level. "Researchers communicate in journals and books so they can communicate in the classroom": This concept . fails to recognize several characteristics of that form of communication called "teaching" which distinguish it from other modes, especially writing. Teaching, when it is done well, is a direct two-way process, whether the feed back is verbal, written, or intuitive. It is an inter-personal process, involving verbal in terchanges, questions and answers, split second responses, on-the-feet thinking. It is a stressful process, requiring presenta tions before large and small groups, guidance of the intellectual activity of groups, and a willingness, upon occasion, to admit ignorance before groups. It is often a mass communication process to admit ignorance before groups. It is often a mass communication process exposing the teacher to .the more or less inquisitive intellectual gaze of as many as three or four hundred students, who come to the classroom with variable levels of . understanding and expertise. Engaging in such activity is a long way from writing an article in a journal, and though it requires the same kinds of knowledge, it is conducted with a largely different set of competencies. "A teacher who has been teaching for' 20 years is better than one who has been teaching for 5 years." It ain't necessarily so. Since effective (and I stress "effective," not "popular") teaching receives such short shrift in faculty evalua tion systems, a terrible teacher can survive for years on the strength of a good research record. Research is relatively easy to evaluate, since it lends itself to quantitative analysis (the more the better), and qualitative analysis (if it's published, it must be pretty good). Teaching, on the other hand, can become the neglected step-child of a research university, and those who would be taught will inevitably suffer the conse quences of this status unless and until somewhat objective qualitative methods of evaluating teaching are devised, .im plemented, and incorporated into the faculty selection and promotion process on an equal footing with research. The bottom line is that good researchers and good teachers are essential to the sur- ALL QUIET 01 THE M1P-EAST PROMT vival and continuing relevance of any academic institution, but not at the ex pense of one another. Good research keeps teaching fresh, and expands the limits of the knowledge which can be taught. But to value research activity over teaching competence, to whatever degree, does a disservice to the people who depend on institutions of higher learning to prepare them for life in a complex society, and who pay the freight for that right through tuition and tax dollars. My job at UNC is to assist faculty and teaching assistants in their instructional ac tivity. It has been both refreshing and en couraging to find faculty who seek out our help, often in spite of a lack of incentives for the improvement of their teaching ef fectiveness. These teachers are fully cogni zant of the relative value the University places on their teaching activity, and have expended extra effort and time to conduct business with us. Such dedication to learn ing is not unique to our clients, but it is, I feel, rare, essential to education, and should be encouraged and rewarded to the same degree for which research activity is rewarded. In the interest of teaching and research, we ask our faculty at the University of North Carolina to wear two hats. However, one of those hats should not be a slightly soiled, beat-up bowler, purchas ed with spare money, on 'spare time in a local shop, while the other is the most fashionable silk top, acquired from the finest national outlet. Given such a choice, there is little question which one they will choose to wear most often. Richard I. Palmer Director, Instructional Development UNC Media and Instructional Support Center H onor Code doesn't always work By BILL WOODWARD Midterm examinations will begin this week and the next, and if you are wondering how to improve your grade, you should give some serious thought to cheating. Lots of students do it, your friends won't report you, and even if you are -caught by a faculty member, it's unlikely that you will be sent to the honor court. At least this is the conclusion that I draw from reading some sur veys that have been conducted among UNC students and faculty during the past eight years. In a survey conducted among 1 ,200 students last year, 80 percent of the respondents said that they believed that at least "some" cheating was going on in their classes. When students in a 1978 survey were asked whether they would feel any obligation to report cheating, nearly 60 percent said that they would feel either "little" or "no" obligation to do so. And no wonder. When the faculty was asked a similar question in 1976, only 40 percent said that they would "almost certainly" report the stu dent to the honor court. Current estimates given by the Department of Student Life are that of 1,500 cheating occurrences each year, fewer than 5 percent are reported. Of course, if you are unlucky enough to get caught and reported, you will probably be suspended. But given the odds, there would appear to be a higher pay-off to drinking beer and partying the night before the exam, V than to putting in those extra hours on the books.. Just make sure you have a good "crib" sheet. , Before anyone accuses me of advocating cheating, let me say that what I'm really interested in is how people who are basically honest deal with unethical behavior. Whether it's bribing an Arab oil sheik for the good of the company, stealing paper clips from the office, or looking over someone's shoulder during the chemistry exam, cheating presents difficult dilemmas for most of us. Part of the tension in a relatively open society is created by being constantly faced with opportunities to cheat. A little shop-lifting here, an under-reported in come to the IRS, or maybe just lying to someone to whom we would rather not tell the truth, puts us all in the shoes of the cheat. Despite all of our rationaliza tions, most of us know when we are doing something that we believe is unethical or illegal. Cheating also has its joys, particularly when we see so- After all, what difference does it make in the "real" world if you footnote every opinion you take from someone else? I believe that most people are caught somewhere in between these two views. We believe that personal re sponsibility and honor are important, yet we also recog nize that under sufficient pressure people will not always Whether it's bribing an Arab oil sheik for the good of the company, stealing paper clips from the office, or looking over someone's shoulder during the chemistry exam, cheating presents difficult dilemmas for most of us. ' meohe else doing it. There is a sense of moral superiority that comes from seeing someone else do something that we aren't. Sometimes this superiority expresses itself in the sense of satisfaction that we are really better than that other person, who couldn't or didn't control himself. On other occasions, catching someone else play ing loose with the rules allows us a feeling of moral out rage that confirms our deeply held belief that the world is going to hell in a handbasket. , The subject of cheating elicits strong feelings in peo ple, particularly among members of the faculty and ad ministration who feel that cheating is a sign of moral degeneracy, and something to be ruthlessly eliminated. Yet even among the most outraged there is a sense of futility; they wonder if anything will actually reduce cheating. . ; Other faculty members and students attack the honor code as a punitive device that is applied arbitrarily to those unlucky enough to be caught. They point out the enormous pressure on students to get good grades in classes in which they have little interest. Cheating be comes a way of beating a system that is uncaring and hostile. Everyone knows that the real purpose of four years at the University is to get through and get that degree. You do whatever you must to achieve that goal. behave responsibly. Often it's not even clear what re sponsible behavior is in a given situation. For example, the honor code tells me that it is my moral obligation as a student to turn in any student I catch cheating. But, like most of the students who responded to the survey, I do not see my obligations in such clearcut terms. Cfertainly I have a responsibility to the University to maintain the standards of academic life. But I also feel a social bond not to "rat" on my fellow students. Some of this re luctance is no doubt due to the fear of being seen as a tattle-tale. Some of it comes from a deeply-held mistrust of any system that uses its members to police each other, however benign its intentions in doing so may be. The University, (the aiministration, the faculty and the students) has established the honor code as a stan dard for appropriate behavior. By following its tenets, students and faculty members are socialized into the or ganization, learning rules that are considered important both inside and outside the system. I have no quarrel with these i jIc a guides for my own behavior. I believe in them. I'm just not sure whether I want to enforce them on you. Bill Woodward is a graduate student in business ad ministration from Los Angeles.
Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
Sept. 30, 1982, edition 1
8
Click "Submit" to request a review of this page. NCDHC staff will check .
0 / 75