Betrayal and plagiarism: on falling in love with students

Through Inside Higher Ed, I found this post: Loving the Liars, by Ryan Claycomb, a professor at West Virginia University.  He and I and countless other profs are dealing with the influx of finals and term papers this time of year, and we're also dealing with the ancient bugbear of plagiarism.

Ryan writes of one of his early experiences with confronting a young fellow who had lifted his final paper entirely from the Washington Post. 

When I figured it out I was so angry--furious--that all afternoon long I was literally seeing red around the edges of my vision, my face was flushed, I couldn't sleep that night.

When I confronted him, long after I had gotten my emotional response in check, he wept like a chil... and still, I thought, "Man, is seeing him cry making up for the anger I felt? That would make me a horrible person." But I just couldn't figure out why it had made me just so mad--it had completely ruined my day. It ruined his, too, but HE did something to deserve it.

You know, we are often reminded by our students how much power we have over them, but we really do give so much back to them--we lay our hearts in their little fingers every time we assign a paper, and have them broken dozens of tiny ways, and mended in another dozen.

For God's sake, we didn't go into this for the money. We went into it because we love it--we love the material, and at our best we love them--maybe not individually, but collectively. And sometimes, just like all the people we love do, they betray us, in little ways and big ways.

My point is, the moment I stop feeling just a little betrayed by my students is a scary one for me. Maybe that's not a bad thing for many people, but for me, and I suspect for others, too, it's a moment I dread, because then it might become just a job, and I never wanted just a job.

In the hypercritical field we're in, it's really very hard to talk about something so unrigorous as love--for the books we read; for the time we spend in front of the classroom; for the stupid little crushes we get on students with bright ideas, and with potential; for the silly idealism of it all. It's important for me to remember, right now especially, as papers pile up, as cribbed papers slide across my desk, as identical wrong answers appear on consecutive quizzes. And I want to tell my students, yes, dammit, it makes me mad. It makes me mad because unrequited love always makes us mad.

(The bold emphases are mine.)  I read this last night, and wanted to call Ryan up on the phone and cry "My brother!  You get it!"  Claycomb nails perfectly exactly why it is that I still get so upset when students plagiarize and cheat.  Even after a dozen years at Pasadena City and close to ten thousand students, I still find myself deeply invested in the work they do and the possibility of witnessing their growth and transformation.

If I can trust my teaching evaluations (not the ones at the uncontrolled online sites, but the in-class ones), I'm a pretty good professor.  And I don't doubt for a second that there is a direct correlation between my love for my students and my success as an instructor.   I teach four classes spread over seven different sections.  This fall I've got three sections of ancient history, which means I give the same lecture three times a week.  No matter how passionate I am about the subject, I will get bored and frustrated if I focus on the fact that I'm delivering the same information thrice weekly.  What turns me on is the certainty that each class is hearing this information for the very first time.

When I lecture, I pace back and forth, making eye contact.  I try to focus on my students as people (it becomes easier as their faces become more familiar).  It may be my 326th time lecturing about Constantine, but it's the first time -- and probably the only time -- that Maria, or Soon, or Armen, or Mike, or Cynthia will hear this information.   That thought excites me every time, week after week, semester after semester.  Thus the only way I can be even remotely effective as a teacher is to personalize the relationship I have with my students.  I'm focused less on my own delivery and more on my students' reception, and if I didn't have intense feelings about my students I wouldn't be able to do that.

Beneath Ryan's post, there's a rather snarky comment from a Mike Lee, who teaches Electromagnetics at Kent State.  Mike writes:

We are educators, not parents. We have classes, not families. We are paid to educate, not sit and decide what students "deserve". Maybe you never "just wanted a job", but the students who are in your classes and the university that hired you did not have that in their contract. You do not get to add your morality and emotional responses to the job.

Perhaps this is the difference between someone who teaches electromagnetics and those of us who teach English (as Ryan does) or history!  No, we are not parents.  But I hate the word "educator", and never use it. It should only be employed by administrators and union hacks, not by real teachers.  I can't quite articulate it properly, but the word "educator" is a "distancing" word -- there's a cold, clinical tone to it that seems utterly at odds with what it is that we're supposed to be doing.

I'll be honest: the teaching style that works for me is modeled on seduction.  Not the sexual seduction of individual students, but the emotional and intellectual seduction of a group.  I walk into my class meeting of the semester confident that a great many of my students don't care about the subject they've signed up for.  They just want their grade and their units and they want to do as little work as possible.  My job is not to convey information -- that's what textbooks are for! My job is to seduce the students into taking a genuine interest. I want to arouse passion, not for the teacher but for the subject. I want them to become fascinated with what they once considered dull; I want them to be turned on by what they once considered deathly and alienating.  In order to do this work and do it well, I need of course to care about history itself -- but I've got to, just like Ryan, care with great intensity about my students.

We use the same word "cheating" to describe both adultery and plagiarism.  Frankly, Ryan's post reminds me that we are right to do so.  My students and I are in relationship together. Like all relationships, it has rules, both spoken and unspoken. It has expectations and hopes.   It has its little compromises and little bargains (I'll let them out early in return for a good overall class score on a test). It also has its little betrayals.  Like so many relationships, especially in high school and college, it is sometimes one-sided.  Sometimes (not so often now that I'm older), students get crushes on me that I can't and won't reciprocate.  Far more often, I try and try to motivate a student to get the work done, take an interest in the course -- and I fail.  I don't fall to pieces when this happens, but I do feel a little twinge, even now, of real disappointment.  And sometimes, the great betrayal comes: I'm cheated on in the form of plagiarism.

Like Ryan Claycomb, I still respond to plagiarism the same way a betrayed spouse responds to infidelity.  Disbelief, followed by rage, followed by a nagging sense that it might all have been my fault!  I ask the same sorts of questions: Was I unclear about what the boundaries were?  Should I give the student another chance?  I have no problem giving failing grades to those who cheat, just as I have no problem justifying terminating a relationship based upon adultery.  But the fact that I can move to a swift and just punishment does not mean that I am not personally affected by the betrayals.

I am in love with one woman.  But I fall in love with my students, collectively, over and over and over again, semester after semester after semester.   I grow older and older each year, and they, for the most part, stay forever youthful.  Where once I was but five years older than my average student, today I am old enough to be their father.  The nature of the love I feel has changed a bit over time, the way all relationships change and grow as we age and mature.  I'm more patient; I'm a heck of a lot less insecure.  But I still love them, just as I love Clio whom I serve, and the day I take that intense emotional urgency out of my teaching is the day I will cease to be a useful professor.

Comments

[Noumena]

I feel that part of what makes plagiarism so shocking and emotionally devastating for the teacher who's given a plagiarised paper is the sheer audacity of the act. In my experience, plagiarism is ridiculously obvious: the student's turned in an astonishingly articulate essay that has little to do with the subject they were supposed to write on, and a quick search of a few sentences in Google or the school's paper mill database turns up the whole thing. To extend your metaphor, Hugo, this isn't like having an affair; this is like having an affair, then coming home smelling of someone else's perfume and wearing a bright red lipstick smudge on your collar! Not only do plagiarising students not care enough to ask for help when they need it, they seem to actually think their teachers to be spectacularly dumb. Plagiarism doesn't indicate a 'mere' lack of concern with one's education; it indicates a deep lack of respect for the intelligence of one's teacher.

[Hugo]

Good point, Noumena -- most of the examples of plagiarism I encounter are similar, and you're right, it does add to the outrage and the hurt.

[NancyP]

It just might be the difference between English and Electromagnetics profs. I don't take what individual students say too personally. I am proud of the ones who actually stay interested in the topic, and ask pertinent questions (or make useful comments about teaching strategies), but the ones who just complain or don't show, I don't pay much attention to them.

Provable dishonesty is a major deal in the health sciences, however. I don't just get hurt or insulted, I start discussions with the student or resident progress committee, and document like crazy, to get them booted from the program.

[Caitriona]

I hate the word "educator", and never use it. It should only be employed by administrators and union hacks, not by real teachers. I can't quite articulate it properly, but the word "educator" is a "distancing" word -- there's a cold, clinical tone to it that seems utterly at odds with what it is that we're supposed to be doing.

Here is another area where you and I differ, Hugo. I LOVE the word "educator." I've *ALWAYS* been an educator, a teacher. That is my passion and my life, and it carries over with me, no matter what I'm doing.

I home educate my children. I work with other people's children. I talk with our customers (and anyone else who's interested) about the health benefits of eating naturally-grown foods and of taking the time to prepare healthy, nutritious meals at home. And I argue passionately with those who think that there is no reason for a year-long geometry course. I may soon be doing a few private/homeschool classes on nutrition and cooking, as well as a few private/homeschool geometry classes.

Education MUST be a passion, no matter the field you're in, no matter if you're getting paid for it or not. Otherwise, it's just a job.

[Breadfish]

This has nothing to do with anything, but you might find this article a little interesting: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/11/1130_051130_sex_ratio.html

[djw]

Yes. At a somewhat lower level of passion, this gets it just about precisely correct for me.

I've often been struck by how some of my favorite students have personalities that might really annoy me in any other capacity. But as students I love them.

[bmmg39]

Don't forget that cheating is also an affront to the honest STUDENTS. I graduated with a 2.72, but I don't feel as embarrassed about that as much now that I realize how rampant cheating, bought essays, and the like are in schools.

And, Hugo, if you haven't already done so, check out plagiarism.org and related sites that will help you discover who's lifting directly from other texts for their "original" essays and term papers.

It might not be a bad idea to make your tests up within 24 hours of the time the students will take them and then make them heavy on essay.

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End violence against women AND men.
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[Sydney]

Great stuff, Hugo. I've been reading you for a while now and always look forward to your posts.

Your post about plagiarism and the feelings of betrayal reminded me of a literature professor I once had. He accused me of plagiarising my final paper. I can assure you, I did not. I'm the type of person who craves the opportunity to show my own work, so why would I copy someone else's? That's just not me.

He told me plagiarism was a serious offense with extremely negative consequences. He said the paper was so good that he wondered if I actually had the capability to write it. What kind of &%(@@$!% is that? What was it about me that made him think I was so incapable? The way I looked? My attire? The backpack I carried? What?

When I told him the writing indeed was my own, he backpedaled and said he initially had thought I'd plagiarised, but then thought that maybe I hadn't. It seems he didn't have any evidence to back up his accusation. I was left wondering why he so carelessly accused me in the first place, since obviously he had no evidence to back up his claim.

I was in shock for a long time. I was shaken by the sense that a professor I greatly admired and respected (and I loved that class) basically told me I didn't have it in me to write a good paper. Not cool.

I'm sharing this to show the anger and betrayal go both ways, and that professors should exercise caution before accusing anyone.

[Hugo]

BG, I have used plagiarism.org and some similar sites; thanks!

Sydney, I never, ever accuse a student of plagiarism until I have proof. You're right -- it does work both ways, and what you describe is indeed a betrayal.

[T. L.]

Hugo, I've taken one of your classes years ago (it was History 1A) and I can assure you that you do a very good job of inspiring passion for the subject in your students. I can honestly say that it was one of the most fun classes I've ever taken and I appreciated the fact that you did so much to make it interesting and exciting.

[Russell]

I appreciate your thoughts on this issue. I have been an adjunct professor at a community college for six years now. There have been several times I've suspected plagarism, but was never able to prove it. Then, just last week, I had a student write a paper that took, almost verbatim, sections of the textbook I assigned. To extend the metaphor of relationship betrayal - it was like walking in on my partner cheating on me - at least my internal reaction. How could he so brazenly plagarize from the textbook I assigned?! Did he think I was stupid? I did manage to relax when I talked with him. It turns out that he did not know that this was plagarism. It sounds odd, but I believe him. He thought he had found some information in a book, which I had asked the class to do, and he used that to write a paper. I talked about it with my class and found out that many did not know what plagarism was. Most knew that you couldn't lift paragraphs from a book and claim it was your own, but many didn't know much more than that. I had an assumption about their knowing about plagarism. I also had an assumption that one would learn about this in high school. Apparently not.

[Hugo]

This is why it is vital for profs to be very explicit about what plagiarism is -- though my experience suggests that genuinely accidental plagiarism is rarer than students would like us to believe. Some of the cries of "But I didn't know" sound awfully disingenuous to me.

[metamanda]

Oh what a relief... I thought I was weird for getting "research crushes". Good to know that it's an actual thing.

[weezie]

Oh, this is excellent...you've said so eloquently what I've always felt about/enjoyed about teaching. And, as a chemistry professor who failed several students one semester a while back for cheating, I can say that you've hit the nail on the head regarding the feeling of betrayal, and that it's not specific to any discipline.

Whenever I discuss academic honesty with my students now, I talk about "the rules", but I also talk quite candidly about how this past incident made me *feel*. I honestly don't think students realize how much we suffer during these incidents, and while we might chuckle ruefully with colleagues about having a student "in the hot seat", the small bit of satisfaction at righting a wrong is quickly overwhelmed by feelings of doubt, guilt, "what have I done to drive them to this?", etc.....feelings that I imagine I might feel as a parent if my son were, say, arrested for a serious crime.

The idea of "seduction", too, is right on--as you might imagine, students don't generally come skipping into my Intro Chem course, and I feel I have succeeded in one of the most important ways if a student indicates that they enjoy coming to class (rather than fearing it/loathing it).

Anyway, loved it...consider yourself bookmarked!