Thursday, May 2, 2013

Last Night's Post Was Confusing in More Than One Way



So I was called in to the office of one of the deans of academic affairs. The meeting appeared to have something to do with my written work, as she had several of my papers spread out on her desk, as well as one of my papers on the monitor of her laptop. As I looked closer, I was able to recognize for reading titles upside down a couple of papers from high school.  I was beginning to grow concerned. concerned.

Once the dean or assistant dean, or whoever she was  began to speak, I realized I had no cause to be alarmed. She said that initially when professors receive papers  [that they actually read] that seem highly polished, they forward copies to the office of academic affairs. For the most part, the papers are filed, and no one even looks at them. They are only reviewed when more than two or three separate compositions end up in the files. At that point, they are investigated for two reasons. Either the student author has beaten the system and has a parent, older sibling, or someone else close to him or her who has written professionally may be doing work for the student, or the student is a legitimately talented writer. An investigation into possible non-elctronic plagiarism is more likely to ensue if the student is not an English major, as it's less rare for an English major to be a skilled writer.  If the student in question is a math, science, or music major, consistently exceptional papers send up more  red flags.

In my case, both of my parents have been published in journals, but my dad's work in particular wouldn't really pertain as it would fall more closely under the umbrella of technical writing than of expository writing.  My mothr's writings were more suspect, but it didn't take the linguist who was cnonsulted long to conclude while scanning the papers with no names attached to sort them into piles of those authored by mom mom and those authored by me.

Electronic cheating had been ruled out, and any easy method of catching me in plagiarism had also been ruled out. When in-class essay tests were compared, the linguist the consulted told them withn 99.4 5 confidence (I'd love to know how he arrived at that precise figure; my guess is that he pressed random buttons guaranteeing a probability equal to or greator than 98. 5%) and went with it.

When it reaches that point, the negative turns into a positive. The personnel in the office of academic affairs looks at what humanities  foundation awards and other monetary grants most closely mesh with the  particular student's qualifications. Any remaining elective or electives that might give a student a particular edge for a particular award are recommended.

 If it were just a framed certificate, I'd say I have more important fish to fry. There is, however, actual cash in substantial amounts attached to these awards. it's worht my whil to at least listen to what the deans and their assistants have to say.  Since I need totake human phonetics eithr before or during medical school, ifone additional linguistics course would give me a decided advantage in wo separate pravately funded foundation awards, and if winning one does not negatively impact one's chances of winning another, it pays to listen to what these people have to say. moreover, the money ganted with these awards comes with no strings whatsoever attached.

I go back to the office of academic affairs to plan my final courses for the next academic year. With tens of thousands of dollars on the line, I'm open to at least listening to their suggestions.

A friend in my a capella group was awarded in excess of eighty-thousand dollars last year. I'm not counting on anything resembling that amount of money, but I'll take anything that is offered carte blanche.

It's funny how soething that started out as a bit as a negative ended up so positive, although i'm not assuming I'll actually receive anything unil the check with my name on it has cleared the bank from which the check was drawn andhas been deposited into my own account.

I'm really, really glad I knew nothing of any of this until the possibility that I had plagiarized had been removed from consideration as far as the office of academic affairs was concerned. Just the thought of it probably would have brought on a severe attack of trichotillomania, which is the very last thing that either I or Jarede needs. Who wants bald spots all over her head, and who wants the name of a girl with scads of bald spots covering her head  tattooed on his bicep?

All of this may come as something of a shock to someone who stumbles across this blog from time to time. I'm usuallyin a rush when I  blog, and I don't edit with mch care. on the other hand, when doing school work, I print out a hard copy, edit it, and then make the edits on the computer  before printing the final copy.  What you're reading is what comes of the top of my head. I sometimes edit, but seldom are things well-thought before being typed. My academic work is carefully organized.

3 comments:

  1. Good for you, Alexis! That must make you feel great!

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  2. Maybe your "luck" has finally taken a turn for the better!

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  3. Sending good thoughts/karma your way.

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