“We… adopt the Honor System, and accept the responsibilities that it entails. As Lasallians, we uphold the values of honest, trust, and respect for others, and vow to practice them in our class and in our daily lives.”
When one signs a contract containing these words, one is, in effect, pledging to do a number of things. That one would not speak to one’s classmates the very second the exam proctor leaves the room; that one would not open one’s notes or books; that one would not glance at the papers of one’s seatmates; and that one would refuse to answer any test-related question asked by one’s classmates… In fact, one should keep one’s mouth shut. The whole point behind the Honor System—which some classes adopt on a trial basis even before the University implements it fully—is that students would benefit from developing a sense of honor and self-reliance. I am for the Honor System if only for the noble aims envisioned by Bro. Roly. I am, however, distraught at a series of decidedly ignoble events I have had the misfortune to witness over the recently concluded term. It would seem that for some people, affixing their signatures on a contract entitle “A Covenant of Honor” meant that they were pledging to do a number of things. That is, speak to one another, swap test answers, and, as if brainstorming weren’t enough, actually leaf through their notes!
I would not say that the Honor System directly caused such rampant cheating. In many of the classes I have had over the past three years, students invariably cheated. Honor System or no. Take for example a ridiculously simple, open-notes test I had recently, which had been announced a week in advance after a torrent of in-depth lectures. When our professor left us alone, almost all the students began conferring with one another as though the preponderance of information provided by their books and notebooks didn’t suffice. I expected more from people whose ambition is to one day serve justice through the legal system (supposedly anyway). If this is the crop of lawyers we expect to have in the future, then I can only wonder what the world is coming into.
This goes to show that the Honor System is not the direct cause of ironic dishonor. This system provides the venue by which people can be honorable. Unfortunately, not everyone chooses to be so.
It is understandable why the Dean of Student Affairs who chairs the Honor System Committee, has explained in a monthly meeting with key people in the University that the Honor System would take long and thorough studies before it could be successfully implemented. It would seem that the committee is banking on introducing a counter-culture of sorts—one that is radically different from whatever academic mediocrity might be evident in the Lasallian community. I said that one cannot force people to swallow an ideology… at least, short of brain-washing them. Something like the Honor System requires a deep-rooted sense of shame and pride as a foundation. Without this, what would stop students from very casually breaking a covenant? I observe that some losers still subscribe to such pathetic excuses as “But everybody’s doing it!” or “It’s the easy way out!”
It’s not any wonder why the University has to heretofore relied heavily on its “police power” to effect academic honesty: A mandatory 0.0 for cheating, and suspension for plagiarism. But as in the case of capital punishment whose deterrent effect might merely be an illusion, such stringent provisions in the Student Handbook do not stop countless people from breaking the law. In relation to this, the logic behind the Honor System is that on does not police mature individuals; one polices only children. Thus, it saddens me that just when we have been given the chance to probe that we are indeed adults, some of us persist in acting like six-year-olds.
If the status of academic (dis)honesty in our Universityis anything to go by, I dread what awaits us in the real world. And since it is where we well be graduating into, it is pertinent to ask these questions: What has our Lasallian education given us? Have we been taught those values that no textbook author can completely expound on? Have we learned anything truly important and meaningful, such as independence, maturity, and honor?
My friend Pats once wrote, “If you don’t have that (honor), you don’t have anything.” Even if you get 3.0’s or higher on Course Cards Day, these grades are ultimately meaningless if you cheated even once during the past term. And even if you think I am not referring to you in this column, even if you think that you might have gotten away with it, only one thing is clear…The loser is you.
