Job Discussion Forums

[Roger]

The criterion by which I judge them is: Are they prepared to adapt to the more competitive rules of the West if they go abroad?
My gut feelings tell me that they are likely to try to export their own morality!
And some actually succeed at this, and get away with it! Judeo-Christian moral values don't stop commercial institutions of higher learning accepting such students - just look at AUS, USA, CAN and some of the students that come back from there!

[MyTurnNow]

Wow, such stories.

I guess I am lucky. I direct a foundation school, preparing the homeys to go study in Western universities. My job is to enforce Western academic standards and to try and "boil out" some of the shoddy practices endemic here.

I walked into rampant cheating and am still fighting near-universal plagiarism. I was in a position to enact a zero-tolerance policy on cheating. Those caught get a zero; chronic repeaters get suspended. Too-identical papers or those too obviously cut-and-pasted from the 'net or a book get handed back to the "authors" along with a tougher assignment.

Do Chinese students cheat?
Yeah. Hell yeah. *beep* yeah.
But at my school, they don't do it twice.

MT

[Sunpower]

Good.

And if you're in a position of decision-making power, then that's great.

I wish I could do that.

Funny you should mention plagarism. I think that's a big problem with my students as well.

I can't get them to put ideas into their own words.

Even when I ask them simple questions in class, they will invariably read word for word out of their text books.

They can't just look at it and then attempt, even, to summarize something although I have tried to encourage that.

[MyTurnNow]

I am truly blessed.
It's all made possible by having- finally- a company behind me that backs me up 110%, has some courage, and wants the same standards of excellence I want. Thank you, CGH!

Without that there could be such rules, and without the rules you will never stop the cheating etc. They will never change as long as they have the option to continue the easy way out.

MT

[ESL Guru]

I once taught in China at a just so so college in Central area.

I failed 9 boys who never came to a single class all semester.

When the final grades were posted all 9 boys had "B" grades for my class.

When I inquired I was told that I had done my job and I was not involved any further.

I slept well at night knowing that I had done my job. The rest is a Chinese to Chinese thing that did not involve me.

They are just lying to each other and that is why the West places no value on a Chinese Uni diploma. We all know that it is just like one from the Philippines, Fiji, Thailand etc., worthless.

It is up to China to adopt a real moral standard or continue to be a "developing" country. The question remains, Developing into what?

[Sunpower]

Sunaru:

I teach at a junior Christian college here in Taipei.

I'm not too sure how to handle the situation sometimes with these students.

ESL Guru:

I can relate to what you're saying about all the students you failed getting a B from the school.

I had the exact same thing happen to me in Japan.

At first, it's pretty shocking, eh?

I couldn't beleive it when I saw the print out of my class grades and the 0% grades had all been bumped up to 60%!

[arioch36]

I am eager to see what the final decision of my school in Zhengzhou is. six failed. three came very close your actually passed the make up. Of the remaing three, two amost never come to class. One is no showing up much of the time, I might let him take the test from last semester over. The other two, no. They still have not officially passed. What will the chool do? Theoretically they should be dismissed from school.
All but one of the other Chinese teachers, and even the other foreign teacher, will just pass them. I asked the other foreign teacher, "Why pass him? Do you think that's fair to the other students? let the college change the grade if they want. Oh, he says, that's the Chinese way, I just pass them all.
So it isn't just the Chinese.

[Peter]

Willy Wo Lap Lam, once a writer for the SCMP ,now working for CNN, wrote a piece about 3 years ago about the all-pervading dishonesty in the whole of China and its effects on education.

Cheating students get their cue from life in general; during my stay in Shenzhen Uni copying from each other and plagiarism were rife.
It was easy to spot and rewarded accordingly

Since 59 is a fail mark i had to inflate my markings by 15 points ;also to get some uniformity with the other English teachers.

I never saw the end results of my finals marks, but I have no illusion.

Some students actually bargained for good pass marks before the finals as well, just a reflection how they dealt with this in the past.

[Peter]

Further to what I wrote about the students, the faculty is (was) equally to blame for the ultra sloppy way they organized student progress,

I never saw a term, semester, or yearly breakdown of progress and achievement.
I was told that i could do what I liked, since my work had no administrative importance, so I asked the studends what they needed.

This is now 5 years ago and nothing is changed; a friend of mine works in Zhuhai Uni, he got the same "freedom", until an "expert" showed up who wanted to flog his mistake ridden textbook on the hapless staff and 1000 students.

[China Pete]

I carry a black felt tip marker during paper tests. i let them know that if i even suspect them of cheating i will quietly walk over and write a big 0 on their paper then theyre free to leave the classroom, and thats the grade that will be put in the book. I usually catch someone in the first few minutes, show no mercy, then after that, no one looks up from their paper or talks at all.
If the class slacker finishes first and gets an A you know something is up, and who helped? If the best in the class is taking forever or are the last to leave, who are they helping? One thing to do to cut cheating in half, is make your test yourself and show it to no one until test day. Hand it to each student, and allow no one to take a copy of the test out of the room. Often students already know whats on the test because of teacher friends or other that can get them a copy of the actual test so they can prepare, or make cheat sheets.
Some highschools teach the kids how to cheat on exams, seriously, and most chinese college professors overlook it if they see a little. Why do they do this? Its about their reputation of teaching and producing students that pass tests.
I have pretty high success in getting College students not to cheat, to come to class, to come on time, and to speak only English in my classroom. Show no mercy. Make late students and students caught speaking Chinese stand up and sing a song to the class- english or chinese are ok. If done right, it will be fun, and you will see dramatic improvements. The class will cheer and chant Sing Sing Sing when you announce that you caught someone speaking Chinese...
One time i told 2 students to leave class and come back next time with better attitudes. They returned 5 minutes later with some sort a Dean Of Students or something. He said I cant tell them to leave class, so i very politely said ok and asked the studetns to take their seats. As he left, i just followed him. half way back to his office he asks where im going, i said im going home- you can go teach my class if you want... finally he came back and escorted those 2 students out of the class so that I would resume class. He made the 2 come back next class and aplolgize to me and the other students for disrupting class...
But overall, give an inch and they will take a kilometer or two. Show no mercy, but do it lovingly.

[ESL Guru]

How can a Chinese student tell a lie if they do not know the difference between a lie and the truth?

How can a Chinese student cheat if they do not know what cheating is?

Look around China and "guanxi" prevails, not truth and integrity western style.

[hubei]

Chinese students don't cheat. It's some of the school administrators..

Let's be realistic, this is china. I've been here for 2 years now and come to realize that technology know how doesn't exist, it is practically you know who.

In my college, students who doesn't even have a basic understanding of english have been admitted into the english department.

1) I failed most of them but they say this. Fail us for all we care, my so and so is one of the #$%@&*# school administrator. He'll instruct the english department to pass me with a high grade. Hell, they did.

2)Then there are these invisible students. On my score sheet I simply put a remark "did not attend a single lesson". Well, the administrators were really a happy lot. The students were hauled in and in the end they were happy, too. Those damn %$#@*&@ SOB gave them a high score, higher than those with a good command of english. You know the reason.(song by ABBA....If I had a little M _ _ _ y, it's a R_ _ h man's world.

all this took place during my first year.

Now, instead of going thru'all these crap. I simply gave the score sheet to the students and have them fill in their desired score to a maximum of 90.It makes my job easier.

That's not the end of my problem, some of the administrators were fuming. They wanted to know the reason why I passed them all. I simply say you will pass them anyway, so what's the difference. Well, I've become their public enemy No.1., but the students have become my best pal. They keep on thanking me for clogging the administrators underground pipelines.

[ESL Guru]

Hubei -

Maybe I missed something here or you did.

So the students are your friends; but they do not make the employment decisions, or the pay decisions, so maybe you have the wrong friends.

The admins need to have the ability to pass the failing students to play the guanxi game. You take them out of the game and that is why they hate you.

You certainly know how to make friends and influence enemies, NOT!

[Roger]

What's up?

Everybody knows that exams in China are scams!

Still, if you were a parent, wouldn't you want your kid to be assured of having "passed" exams at a "reputable" institution of learning?

That's where the ranking of Chinese schools comes in!
They all have a rank given them by authorities and the media.
I do not know how these rankings are arrived at. Maybe if a provincial chieftain's kid attended school there, the school automatically gets ranked as a top-level school.

What's more certain is that parents childishly trust these claims. And these claims are supported by statistics.

Statistics... Would you enrol your kid at a school if it claimed that only 60% of its students passed its final exams last year? Probably not. We would assume something is wrong with the SCHOOL, not with the learners, right?

And that is why there must be a magic statline. It is set at 90% Never have I seen any school bragging that less than 90% of its students passed exams last year!
So 90% it is then!
And once 90%, always 90%, or increasing!

But why the original question?
DOes anybody really take Chinese pass rates and exams seriously?

If you have to pass your own students you can't be doing an honest job!
This is like a father acting as policeman to his own child! In Guanxiland, akas China, relationships between teachers and students seldom are anything less than incestuous!

[China Pete]

Good point ESL Guru,
They dont know what cheating is unless theyre told. (The first thing that comes to mind is why do they try to hide it if they supposedly dont know its wrong?)
But aside from that, yeah, I forgot to mention that I always tell them EXCATLY what I see as cheating and EXACTLY what the punishment will be.
"If you have answers written on your hand, even if you dont look at them during the test, I will consider that as cheating, and you will get a ZERO"
"If you look up off your own paper and it appears that you may be gazing in the direction of someone elses paper, I will consider that as cheating, and you will get a ZERO"
"If you 'accidentally' think out loud, I dont care what youre saying, any verbal noises during a paper test, I will consider that as cheating, and you will get a ZERO" (this one is obviously not for the oral exam)
etc, etc, etc.
It is fair to have strict rules like that IF you let them know ahead of time exactly what is expected. If caught, I usually ask them to repeat the rule referring to what they did, and ask if they remember the penalty.