This article is the first of a series.
“Everyday heroism” and “Heroism in small ways”: these are the rationales used by a teacher who sold Php 450 worth of coffee to her students in exchange for the 15 percentage of the total grade, rationales which equate, justify, even uplift the act of purchasing said coffee, affirmed in class to be in line with the subject, which focuses on Filipino icon Jose Rizal’s life and acclaimed heroism.
Some time during their first few weeks of class, the students of said course, from three different sections, were granted with three options as a project from their professor to choose from: Attendance in a field trip for a cumulative fee between Php 800 to 900 entailing the submission of a report on it, the submission of three individual research projects, or the mere purchase of Php 450 worth of coffee.
The coffee, while not commercially recognized and publicly accredited in the Philippines, is considered a health supplement being distributed by an international marketing group, and whose sale is still in question with regards to approval by authority. Regardless, students from all three sections under the professor’s class allegedly purchased the coffee to secure 15 percent of the total grade.
“It was more comfortable to buy the coffee instead [of doing other projects]”, said *Penny from the class. “We didn’t want to do the other projects,” justified another student from one of the three sections.
Originally the price of the coffee was said to be at Php 350, which later on increased to Php 450 with the justification that the professor is going to return the additional fee. No return was made, the source says, from the professor, but the students were addressed with an explanation that the additional fee would instead be treated as donations for cancer patients, in line with practicing “coffee for a cause” and the display of “heroism in small ways.”
Under the Code of Ethics for faculty as stated in the Faculty Manual, states that faculty members are to “respect their students as persons, i.e. under no circumstances will they exploit, harass, and discriminate against students.” In other words, faculty members must in ideal not abuse positions in authority as educators against students in order to promote self-interest, whether commercial or personal, by baiting the students with grades.
The misuse of the University name – by acting as its faculty member and acting beyond the reasonable limits for academic freedom – for personal and commercial purposes is listed as an offense in the same manual.
But how can one distinguish between the just exercise of a professor’s academic freedom and a potential case for student exploitation?
Freedom subject to authority of reason
While professors are highly encouraged to follow the course syllabi prescribed by their respective departments for the suggested manner of teaching a particular course, professors are, as empowered by the Philippine Constitution of 1987 and current jurisprudence and expressed in the Faculty Manual, to “inquire, discover, publish and teach the truth as they see it in the field of their competence… subject to no control or authority except the control or authority of the rational methods by which truths or conclusions are sought and established in these disciplines.”
In an October 2012 article published in The LaSallian entitled ‘Grading and the responsibility of academic freedom’, Faculty Association President Dante Leoncini stated, “There are certain criteria that will have to be followed. Some are established by the department itself, as stipulated in the syllabus; but other faculty members have other ways and other criteria [with which] to grade their students.”
Academic freedom applies only insofar as the basis for student grades is declared at the start of classes. In this vein, students may choose to question how a certain output is not reasonably related with the criteria established during the first day of classes.
In the cited article, Leoncini added, “Now if the faculty member determines that the grading system suggested or prescribed by the department is inappropriate or inapplicable in his or her case, the professor is obligated to inform the class during the first day how he or she gives grades. That should be clear. Based on certain criteria, not because of whims or caprice. There are many points or aspects you can use for criteria. The professor may opt to use only one, like the correctness of an answer to an essay question for example. Some professors are meticulous and may include, for example, the grammar, the focus, the continuity of the student’s work. There are others who simply deem if the student’s work is totally correct, partly correct, or incorrect.”
Even with this clarity, even if a faculty member may indicate that students be graded by a certain metric, which the teacher is free to set according to his or her own experience in the discipline, the activity in question is still subject to the authority of “rational methods by which truths or conclusions are sought and established” in the teacher’s discipline.
Simulation of learning?
“We are here to educate the students… students should not be involved in profitable undertakings,” remarks the chairperson of a department, who wished to remain anonymous, from which a professor, teaching a certain specialized majors course on development in international settings, required students to engage in work similar to that of employees in a development organization, by tasking them to participate in preparation for an international summit, where the professor sits as a chair in one of the committees.
The students were divided into four committees, and were accordingly tasked to search for the potential sponsorship partners, to invite media, and to search for contact details of important people and send invitations, among other similar PR- and logistics-related tasks.
The service to the summit was announced to be an additional load with implications for the midterm grade or final grade, on top of the exams the students were required to take. Fourth year student Boy*, a part of the majors class, attests that the professor had failed to introduce the summit as being a part of the grading requirements during the period for orientation of the grading system.
Section 31 of the Students’ Charter, the effective and binding list of provisions on student rights, as provided in the Student Handbook and applicable to all members of the University community, reads that “except those approved by their own student organizations, all involuntary contributions shall be prohibited.”
The trust placed on teachers to conduct the business of teaching, under the charism of St. La Salle, is best exemplified by the Faculty Manual’s Code of Ethics as stated: “[Faculty] avoid conduct which runs counter to the moral standards of society.”
All cases – the professors, sections and subject matters – presented in this article are based on real, actual cases occurring this term and are still currently being investigated by their respective departments for definite resolution as of press time.
*Names were changed in order to protect anonymity of sources
