The Decree
VOL. 5, NO. 11 North Carolina Wesleyan College, Rocky Mount, N.C. FRIDAY, APRIL 13,1990
Cheating widespread at U.S. colleges
As many as nine out of 10 stu
dents have plagiarized a paper
sometime during their college
careers.
Miami University of Ohio
Prof. Jerold Hale and two col
leagues surveyed 234 students,
and found that 91.2 percent of the
students admitted to having com
mitted at least one of four aca
demically dishonest practices in
connection with written assign
ments.
Of those, 74.2 percent failed
to cite a reference for para
phrased or quoted material, 44.2
percent passed off another
student’s work for their own,
40.8 percent failed to note a
word-for-word quote as a direct
quotation, and 39.9 percent used
misleading references to hide
plagiarism.
The results echo a survey re
leased by Harvard Universities
Institute for Educational Man
agement in early March that
found that 30 percent ot tne
nation’s college students have
•cheated on term papers or exams.
! In addition, 43 percent of
(5,000 professors told the Came-
■gie Foundation for the Advance-
Iment of Teaching that today’s
; undergraduates are more willing
■ than their predecessors to cheat to
get good grades.
When asked, some Wesleyan
students admitted that they had
' dishonestly used documented in
formation. They also asked to
i remain nameless.
li
\
GETTING OUT — The cast of the recent Wesleyan Players Production, "Getting Out," directed by
Vaughn Schiitz, gave their performance last Saturday. This drama was the second production of the
year. (Photo by Kevin Davis.)
HSA officers go to Memphis
to attend regional conference
The Honor Student Associa
tion executive officers went to
Memphis, Tenn., on March 28 to
participate in the Southern Re
gional Honors Conference.
Representing the vVesleyan
Honor Association were: Chris
tine Adams, President; Michael
Walsh, Vice-President; John
Heame, Secretary, Melissa Jop
lin, Treasurer, and the Honor Di
rector, Dr. Steve Ferebee. The
conference had participants from
all across the southern region.
Schools from North and South
Carolina, Florida, Georgia, Ken
tucky, Mississippi, Alabama,
Virginia, Tennessee, and Louisi
ana were all present.
Many of the schools gave
presentations, including a presen
tation by Wesleyan on the Ethics
of Capital Punishment. This pres
entation was well attended and
quite successful. The presenta
tion given by Wesleyan exam
“Oh, yeah I’ve bought a paper
from ECU before,” said one
North Carolina Wesleyan stu
dent. The paper was purchased
for $20 and used at Wesleyan,
where the paper received a “B,”
instead of the original grade of
“C” at ECU.
Dr. Steve Ferebee said that he
was able to tell when students are
guilty of plagiarism, but found
that it was hard to prove, because
the only way to prove plagiarism
would be to find the exact text.
The root of the problem,
Miami’s Hale says, is the intense
pressure placed upon students to
achieve academically.
But not all students say that
justifies cheating.
“If the overall goal is to suc
ceed in college, you’d think stu
dents wouldn’t cheat,” said Paige
Foster, a student at the University
of Kentucky.
“Pressure to get good grades is
no excuse to cheat,” said Bonnie
Wiese of Keene State College.
Wesleyan begins
early registration
to end long lines
ined basic arguments for and
against the death penalty. After a
short introduction the room was
broken up into six groups, and
each group was given a case. The
groups were to weigh the argu
ments for and against the death
penalty, and act as if they were a
jury and decide whether or not the
person in each case deserved the
death penalty.
These groups interacted very
(Continued on Back Page)
By SYLVIA BROWN
Early registration at NCWC
April 2-11 is expected to shorten
registration lines in August. “The
purpose of Early Registration is
to eliminate that long line on reg
istration day for as many students
as possible” said Cliff Sullivan,
the Registrar of NCWC.
“If a student completes early
registration procedures and takes
care of financial obligations by
the appropriate date they will re
ceive a copy of their classes
schedule, either in the mail or
when they complete their finan
cial aid obligations here on cam
pus,” said Sullivan.
Early registration procedures
let students plan their schedule
form with their faculty advisor if
submitted to the Registrar’s Of
fice by 5 p.m. on April 11.
“We have been thinking about
changing the registration process
a long time. We really began to
seriously work on it I guess about
a year and a half ago,” said Be
linda Faulkner, Business Officer
Manager.
Sullivan said “I have been
working on this new process over
two years. On just putting infor
mation together, stealing ideas
from other colleges and present
ing them to the Vice President
and Dean.”
“A lot of departments are in
volved in this new process, such
as Admissions, Financial Aid,
Data Processing, Student Life,
Registration, The Business Of
fice, Adult Degree Program, and
just about every office here on
campus. This is why it has taken
so long to organize,” said
Faulkner.
Senior Vanessa Roberts said
“I think it’s about time that
NCWC did something about
those ridiculous registration
lines. I just wish they had up
dated registration years ago.”
“I’m happy to hear that now
we will not have to wait in line to
register. As an adult student it
really means a lot not having to
rush over from work to register
for one or two classes which I had
to do for the old registration proc
ess,” said Duane Godwin.
NCWC has now started a reg
istration system that some feel
should have been in use since the
beginning of the 80’s. Surround
ing schools such as Atlantic
Christina College, East Carolina
University, and North Carolina
State University have been using
early registration for at least the
ten years.