PAGE FOUR
lablished Twesday through
Sat relay mornings staring
the University year. the
Daily Collegian is a student
operated newspaper.
Entered so aecuad-clan matter Jab . 5. 1534 at Ms Stat. College. Pa. Post 011ie* ander Ow act ar Nardi 2. 1515
MIKE PEINSILBER, Editor
MIKE ►TILLER. Associate Editor
STAFF THIS ISSUE: Night Editor, Evie Onsa; Copy Editors, Sue Conklin, Rog Alexander; Assist
ants, Thom Shiels, Joe Boehret, Joe Cheddar, Barb Martino, Jane Klein.
Something Else We Can Do About Cheating
Twelve thousand students are interested
enough in a degree to come to State College
every fall, but unfortunately and probably
naturally, all 12,000 of them cannot be expect
ed to want to learn. A diploma will help them
get a job, but an honestly gotten diploma has
little more apparent value to many of them
than one stolen from a set of crib notes.
So, students cheat. This, also may be natural.
but it is hardly desirable unless the school's
rating can stand an academic jolt.
It's a common belief that the size of Penn
State and the fact that it is a state university
are responsible for the high degree of cheating.
"The school's too big," ls the most frequent
reason student give when they say, never
work here" and "Some students are always
going to cheat."
But this pessimistic thinking is not valid.
The University teaches calculus. Some people
learn it and others do not. The University does
not teach honesty. If it did, some people would
learn it and others would not, but this is not
reason enough to abandon efforts to install
some kind of course in honesty?
In an article for the April, 1956 McCall's
Elizabeth Pope said a poll conducted by New
Jersey's Fairleigh Dickinson College among
3500 students in 40 high schools and colleges
showed less than a third of the students regard
ed cheating as an act of delinquency. People
making the study were confronted with com
ments like, "How else are you supposed to get
ahead?" and "It's okay if you get away with
it," and "It can't be so bad when everyone I
know does it."
Mrs. Pope elaborated upon the many reasons
why students cheat, other than that they could
see little harm in it. She mentioned home pres
sure and average requirements for graduate
school. But there is no sense going into these
causes since the University can do little to cor
rect them. Parents will always want their chil
dren to do well in class: there will probably
always be some conflict because of it, but the
University's concern is to educate students and
not appease mothers and fathers.
The University must be equipped to educate
its students to be honest right along with edu
cating them to be informed. Its methods must
be so geared as to reach all students regardless
Kneecaps: Naughty?
Bermuda shorts are respectable on the ground
floor of the HUB. But they're indecent and un
lawful on the first and
second floors. Isn't that
amazing?
Isn't it startling that
in 1956. 36 years after
the adoption of the wom
an's suffrage amendment
and the same year that
women own some 80 per
cent of the nation's capi
tal wealth, Penn State's
coeds have to battle for
the right to wear Ber
muda shorts on the golf
course or above the
ground level of a build
ing constructed for stu
dent recreation?
Isn't it a sorry corn
mentary that these ar
chaic, Victorian age rules
on the books?
Isn't it silly that Penn
State's Women's Student
Government Association
has to concern itself with
where Bermuda shorts
shall and shall not be
worn'
Isn't it paradoxical that
in sociology classes in Sparks we learn that
only society itself can dictate its folkways
while in Old Main we deny this?
In fact. isn't it all conduct detrimental to the
good sense of the student body?
What you should
know about—
SENIOR BALL
Music by
Billy Butterfield
,
Time: FRIDAY, MAY 4; 9-1
Price: $5.00 per Couple
Dress: Semi-Formal
Ask her now to SENIOR BALL May 4
011 r BAB eatirgian
5.«..... a• THE FREE LANCE. est 1861
, -
. -
... •
."' • 1- *
Nti" • .
•
Shocking?
—The Editor
Spring arrived So Did Our
'NEW' CARD ASSORTMENT
Want a card (greeting, get well,
congrats) that's different? Want
01/1114h to say something special to
someone. Well, our new selec
*ol • tion gives jou the chance to
vc e
Akio; ,
P.S. Also remember to get your
Mother's Day cards early while
there's still a good supply.
0 0 TREASURE HOUSE
(The Store With "The" Window)
114 E DAILY COLLEGIAN. STATE COLLEGE. PENNSYLVANIA
ROGER VOGELSINGER. Badness btanaett
of their pre-college cheating habits, their home
background, and their "set" ways.
Regardless of the form a future honor system
might take or the scope it might eventually
take in, concrete plans must be made now to
change student attitude and pave the way for
honesty at the University.
In a school the size of Penn State, endoctri
nation certainly presents a problem. The tools
of implementation are many. but the most prac
tical seems to be the utilization of advisors for
the task. Of course, the relationship between
advisor and advisee varies from curricula to
curricula, but he usually knows his advisees
by name by the end of their freshman year
and should enjoy a better level of communica
tion among them than he does among the stu
dents in his classes in general. For this reason
and due to the fact that he is in a position
to gain the student's respect as a leader in the
student's field or profession, he is the person
to introduce the student to a system of academic
honesty.
Naturally the advisor will have to undergo
a period of training before he is equipped to
instruct his students, so this is where the al
ready established Academic Honesty Commit
tee can be usefuL Since these committeemen
are supposed to be familiar with honesty poli
cies and principles effective at other schools.
they should be in a position to set standards of
procedure for the advisor to follow in the hon
esty indoctrination.
This training should cultivate such an attitude
in the students' mind that they would realize
the necessity and certainly the desirability of
being honest, especially in academic work.
They should be shown the results of cheating
on a level that will be understandable to them.
This suggestion may sound ridiculous, but
Penn State is on the bottom rung in honesty
understanding, and to get through to the aver
age cheater is to take this first, very practical
step.
The indoctrination the advisor would give his
students should open their minds to the possi
bility of establishing small-scale class and de
partmental honor systems. Systems in workable
condition should be referred to, perhaps in the
hope of inciting a feeling of rivalry among the
members of these individual groups. But no
where should coercion be used, for if the stu
dents don't really want to work on their honor,
success on any level is almost impossible.
In classes where students prefer close proctor
ing to the honor system, now-existing Univer
sity regulations for classroom discipline should
be followed. It is conceivable that classes might
even be divided when tests are administered,
with one group under rigid supervision and the
other on its honor.
Many details are yet to be worked out, but it
is with these details that the Academic Honesty
Committee should concern itself and not so
much with how to catch and punish students
who are "expected" to cheat. The committee has
definitely started out on the wrong foot in its
rigid classification of degrees of dishonesty and
vigorous attempts to stop cheating at all costs.
Because this is Penn State, education for the
masses, we must not be discouraged in our at
tempt to teach honesty to the masses by a flood
of below grades. Of course there's nothing that
says we Can't toss the failures out of school,
but right now we must begin to teach these
12,000 students something about honesty.
Apparently they know - very little.
—Jackie Hudgins
Safety Valve
Grace's Figure (of Speech)
TO THE EDITOR: In Miss Conklin's article on
the Matrix Banquet, she reported Mrs. Crist as
saying, (quoting from the article) "—a well
known figure like Grace Kelly." We should like
to know who told Mrs. Crist that Grace Kelly
has a figure.
Editorials represent the
viewpoints of the writers.
sot necessarily the policy
of the paper, the student
body. or the University.
—John Newlin
Bruce Batdorf
Ed Stoker
Joseph Stecker
Little Man on Campus
r l4
I SEE 'THEY'VE PATCHED 'THINGS UF:'l'
What's Our Ultimate Aim?
Foreign Policy
To Be Reappraised
By J. M. Roberts
Associated Press News Analyst
In his promised reappraisal of America's foreign aid policy, one
of the first things Secretary Dulles will need is a recapitulation of
just what the nation is trying to do.
For nearly 10 years now the chief emphasis of American foreign
policy has been on development
of a system of :Alliances, political,
economic and military, with
which to insure that the post-war
tide of Russian expansion will
rise no higher.
The nation is now carrying
global commitments, through
the Western Hemisphere Pact,
NATO. SEATO, and bilateral
agreements. It has become un
active participant in the eco
nomic phases of the Baghdad
Pact. Hardly a nation anywhere
has not received some form of
American aid since World War
Yet a number of nations remain
uncomitted in the cold war, ei
ther by treaty or by sentiment,
and some of them, like India, are
of great importance.
In the beginning, American
aid was extended through the
United Nations, UNRRA. It
went directly to the grass,roots
of postwar agony, taking care of
people.
Then came the Marshall Plan,
the first great unilateral action by
the United States designed to pre
vent Communist expansion in
Europe. It was offered to every
one, but the Communist bloc
turned it down in one of its first
open declarations - of cold war.
The four years of the Mar
shall Plan were not over when
developments in Europe and
Asia, particularly the Korean
war, shifted American aid em
phasis from the economic to the
military. And there it has
stayed until Russia.. taking a
page from the American book,
des Nt , ,
;~ ~....
~t.
Where University Park, Pa.
When April 28th - May 3id
But What
FRIDAY, APRIL 20, 1956
By Bibler
/>
1 I
adopted the lessons of the Mar•
shall Plan to her own use.
Through all these meanderings
there has been a tendency in the
United Statea—a tendency fre
quently criticized by foreigners
who have not been heard very
well amid the din of the Amer•
ican-Russian quarrel—to let fund.
amental objectives drift into the
background.
Froth to Stay on Sale
Froth will continue on sale to
day at the Corner Room, Mall
bulletin board, and the Hetzel
Union desk.
Gazette
INTERLANDIA FOLK DANCERS Bal.
kan-Slovak Party. 7:45 p.m.. S White
Hall
INTER-VARSITY CHRISTIAN FEL.
LOWSHIP. 7:30 p.m.. 405 Old Main
NEWMAN CLUB Spring Fling. 9 p.m..
Church Hall
University Hospital
Robert Brandt, Samuel Feinstein,
Thomas Foster, Harry Fuehrer„ Erwin
Masson, James Spongier. Richard Sut.
ton. Lynnwood Sweigard.
Student Employment
Camp Sinking Creek, Pennsylvania—.
April 21?
Camp Echo Trail, Pennsylvania+
April 24
Indian Lake Camp, Pennsylvania—..
April 27-28
Tonight on WDFM
ILI OtEGACYCLES
6:45 _ Sign OR
6:50--
New's, Sports
7:00 _ ------- Jan:.
7:30
8:00 ______-
9:15 Fl Open House
11:00 Sign Off
Panorama
==i
Marathon
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