At the end of the fall semester, the Honor Committee hosted a round table discussion with representatives of several minority groups. One topic of discussion was the disproportionate rates at which non-majority students are reported to the Honor System. From that discussion, I took away a few difficult questions. Answering these questions should receive high priority in our community.
Why are minority students more likely to be reported to the Honor Committee?
There are several possible explanations. Two in particular receive much attention. It is important to decide which is most plausible if we have any hope of tackling this problem.
The first possible explanation is “spotlighting.” That is, minority students are unduly singled out because they stand out from the crowd of students. My experience suggests that this is the conventional wisdom’s explanation for the disproportionate rate. But I am not yet convinced it tells the whole story.
A second explanation is “dimming.” The theory is that underreporting of majority students is the problem, rather than over reporting of minority students. Data available to the Honor Committee lend some credence to this explanation. A study from a few years ago indicated that, though minority students are more frequently reported to the system, the outcomes of their cases do not vary from majority students’ outcomes in a significant way. To my mind, this might indicate that reporting witnesses are not unfairly targeting minority students (at least not regularly). Instead, majority students’ cases are more often being handled informally outside the Honor System.
Why is addressing this problem important?
I can think of at least two reasons. First, the demographic distortion in the Honor Committee’s reporting rate cannot help but alienate a significant portion of those which it serves. The imbalance creates a perception of discrimination that surely illegitimates the Honor System in the eyes of many.
Additionally, the distortion could also be a sign of other problems. If dimming is, indeed, a root cause of this problem, then we should be concerned about systemic underreporting of Honor cases.
How can we address this problem in an earnest, forward leaning way?
It is easy to throw up one’s hands when confronting a problem like this. Naturally, one attributes the distortion to latent macro-cultural problems whose solutions will be found far outside grounds. While it is true that there are limits to what we can actually do, that does not mean that there is nothing worth doing. Some possible mechanisms for addressing the problem include:
1. Encourage members of the University and local community to report case of lying, cheating, and stealing to the Honor Committee rather than handling them informally.
2. Relatedly, find ways to better inform members of the community about the distortion that might be created by informal case resolution.
3. Continue to seek ways to improve recruiting for Honor support officer positions among minority groups. Doing these helps keep this problem on the agenda, counter the sense of alienation, and increases the reservoir of ideas on how to address the problem.
What do you think?
This is a sensitive and very difficult issue. Please offer your thoughts in response to any of the above mentioned questions. You can contact me directly and jch6b@virginia.edu or post below. Please observe reasonable standards of propriety when offering your thoughts. I reserve the right to remove posts that are inappropriate.
Friday, January 25, 2008
Honor and Spotlighting, Dimming
This post represents the thoughts and opinions of Josh Hess only.
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12 comments:
I am glad to see the Honor Committee seriously examining this phenomena. I have concerns about ESL students as well, particularly since many of the concepts involved in honor offenses may not be well understood. Does any evidence exist to lend credence to my view?
My understanding is that there are three types of students who are more likely than average to be reported for cheating: international students, athletes, and African Americans.
I think its important to consider that the *reasons* why these three groups are more likely to be reported might be *different* for each group.
International students, for instance, may be less familiar with American standards of plagiarism and citation. This is not an excuse -- an individual assumes responsibility for learning the these rules when they enroll (the same way that I would be held accountable under French law, for instance, if I broke a law in Paris).
Athletes are a harder issue. Perhaps there is a higher incidence of *apparent cheating* -- they may not cheat any more than an average student, but perhaps they aren't as good covering it up? Let's remember that athletes are under unusual time and grade pressures; moreover, some may not have had the same amount of formal writing and citation training in high school. Again, this is no excuse, but it might help explain things.
Finally, African Americans. There's *no* intuitive reason to believe that African American students would be unfamiliar with citation, under more pressure, or be more inclined to cheat. My sense is that Josh's description of dimming makes sense -- perhaps faculty members are more likely to initiate against a black student than a white one.
In the case of African Americans -- more than with international students and athletes -- there's a strong case to be made that "dimming" is unjust. In my mind, faculty members should initiate every case of cheating; this is the way to make the system "just."
Importantly, once students get into the system, they seem to be treated very fairly. I think this is an important point, but is often lost in the spotlighting debate. The system is (internally) fundamentally fair -- it would be *fairer* if faculty would initiate for every case they saw.
it is no longer accurate to say, unfortunately, the African-American students are treated fairly once they are in the system. A look at the last couple of years confirms this. Last year, 50% of accused African-American students were convicted at Trial, compared to 36% of white students. Similarly, two years ago, 83% of African-Americans accused were convicted, compared to just 38% of white students.
While there was a time we could confidently say that all students were treated equally once within the system, it appears even this is no longer accurate.
you assume that all students who have a case initiated against them are equally innocent/guilty. that is not necessarily true, especially when working with such small numbers.
a higher conviction rate does not necessarily mean that these students were treated unfairly.
You're correct, but the consistency of the last two years bothers me. Additionally, when a disproportionate number of African-Americans are already reported, that implies either spotlighting, which would mean that African-Americans are getting reported for less obvious offenses than their white counterparts, or dimming, which would mean that it just takes a more obvious offense before someone reports a white student. Either way, the conviction rates amongst white students should then be at least as high, if not higher.
dimming very well may be occurring.
that is why professors (or students, in the less-frequent occurrence that they witness cheating) should report an Honor case every time they see cheating.
the key here, though, is not to label the system as being racially biased--it is the pool of people who report cheating. labeling the system as "racist" or "biased," though, will only drive the uninformed faculty member to initiate LESS cases--perhaps exacerbating the problem.
I'm interested to know what Josh means when he says "majority students' cases are more often being handled informally outside the Honor System." Does that mean people's friends get them off before entering the system?
I think what Josh is referring to is the propensity of some professors to deal with cheating students personally (by confronting them, making them redo an assignment, or lowering their grade, but not reporting them).
The system is bogus. Giving students who are on the honor committee who feel so small and insignificant that they just want to cause an effect on the university commmunity--to have the authority to dismiss classmates, with whom they are competing in this very competitive university--and decrease competition to make up for their insolence. It disgusts me that a decision so grave can be placed in the hands of insolent, incapable, irrational, and oftentimes morally incompetent individuals.
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