Constructive Criticism
In my Online Accounting 107 class we were assigned a group project. Professor Diamond told us that if anyone in our group plagiarized their part that the entire group would get 0 on the assignment (12% of the grade). There were a number of people who complained in our online discussion (more participation than for anything else on the discussion boards).
I sent the following private email to Professor Diamond
Rob,
I’m afraid you are responsible for the negative comments about the group report by the way you framed the Plagiarism position.
You already made it clear at the beginning of the course what your position was.
By directing people to the idea that one member of the group could cause the entire group to fail you asked people to think these negative thoughts.
A positive statement of encouragement and trust would have gone a long way toward helping your students to do their best work instead of being focused on the worst outcome.
You are the leader. You set the tone at the top. I know you can and will do better.
Yours Truly
Jeff Bellamy
He responded with this
Jeff,
Your e-mail was diverted to my spam box since it did not have the subject line as requested in the course syllabus.
Without being clear of my expectations, some students will plagiarize. I’m sure you would not have wanted your grade to be reduced to zero because another student in your group did not clearly understand the consequences of plagiarism.
It may appropriate for you to give a reprimand such as this to faculty in the future when you are a dean, but not today. And you may one day be able to give advice, hopefully with a more collegial tone, when you have greater teaching experience than other faculty. You may one day become a peer to other professionals or possibly be in a position of authority, at which time it might be appropriate to use first names. Given our current faculty-student relationship, it would be appropriate to offer suggestions in a less reprimanding tone and address me as Professor Diamond.
Rob Diamond
To which I responded
You will note that I always address you as Professor Diamond in class forums. If you don’t want me to address you by your first name ever, then please extend me the same courtesy.
It really is not necessary to have an academic position to understand how an authority figure in a group sets the tone. The fact that you seemed to have missed that, and continue to miss it, speaks volumes.
Yours Truly
He Whose Name Must Never Be Spoken
To which he replied
Jeff,
Your suggestions are invited. Your tone and chastisement are not and must stop. If not, I will invoke campus policy to suspend you from the class.
Professor Diamond
It’s interesting that you titled this post “constructive criticism”.
Phrases like “you asked people to think these negative thoughts” aren’t likely to be seen as “constructive”, particularly when your original message is essentially “there’s a lot of worry and it’s your fault”. Your professor gave you a very clear reason why he expressed himself as he did: Without a clear boundary, people may think it’s okay to do the wrong thing. Warnings like that in the syllabus are almost always based on a history of past abuse by earlier classes.
I’m sure he’d like to find that you and your classmates are exceptionally honest and don’t need to be told that there are negative consequences to breaking the rules. I’m sure you understand the importance of those rules, and the need for clear consequences if they’re broken: Accounting is full of rules!
As for calling him by his first name, uninvited – you tried, indirectly, to be the “authority figure” that set “the tone” for that particular interaction. The tone you tried for was that of a superior gently correcting a stumbling student. You probably could have packed in more condescension if you’d tried, but it’s difficult to see how.
If you’d been concerned about “the tone” and thought that the class needed an extra “authority figure” to set things straight – why didn’t you speak up on the discussion board? You could have pointed out that it’s silly to worry about breaking the rules if you don’t plan to break them. You could have started a productive discussion about how to properly acknowledge ideas and sources. You could have found resources on how to tell plagiarism from paraphrase, if you thought that your professor hadn’t covered those things well enough in class.
Part of getting a college education is learning how to communicate effectively. You chose a spectacularly ineffective way to communicate your “suggestions”. In the process, you missed an opportunity to lead the discussion productively. Instead of identifying yourself as a leader by your actions, you identified yourself as a smarmy know-it-all by your words.
First off I did chastise Professor Diamond and of course I set the tone since I initiated the communication which I did in private.
Your suggestion of using the discussion boards has some serious problems. Posting “it’s silly to worry about breaking the rules if you don’t plan to break them” is not untrue but has nothing to do with the particular situation which was that you would be penalized for something that you didn’t do and that was outside of your control.
The one in control was Professor Diamond. To criticize his behavior in front of the class would be disruptive and rude.
You say that my communication was ineffective. Do you believe that if Professor Diamond agreed that he could have handled his class direction better that the way I communicated it would stop him from changing that class direction. That would be to assume he was petty and immature.
While you condemn me you must admit that I make no secret about who I am.
Who are you?
In a group assignment, the entire group is responsible for what’s turned in, which is why the entire group shares the credit – or the punishment for plagiarism. Perhaps the assignment in your class was somehow set up so that people could only see their own work in the CMS, but were responsible still for those of others. You could have clarified that issue pretty easily – “Prof. Diamond, it looks like the website won’t let us see each other’s work, is it okay to email it to each other so we can check that all the references are correct?”.
The actual idea itself (which I’ll sum up as “assume that people won’t plagiarize, and don’t mention that it could happen”) ran counter to the unfortunate majority of experience – plagiarism is a significant problem, particularly in introductory classes, particularly in online classes, and it’s much easier to have a policy against it from the start. He addressed your idea in what sounds like a fair and reasonable way.
The way you expressed it – including your choice to use his first name, uninvited, and yes, some professors get a real bee up their butt if you do that! – was almost guaranteed to distract from the idea. You implied that it was his fault if people plagiarized. He expressed it well himself – your tone (“I know you can and will do better”) would have been appropriate if, and only if, you were his experienced supervisor.
No, I don’t know that he would’ve refused to accept the idea if it had been a good one, JUST because of your tone. I do know that some ideas only get accepted after a second look. You sent him an idea that was kind of average-bordering-on-bad, as far as usefulness. (“Don’t tell us what your rules are in advance” is hardly ever a good idea.) When you have one of those and you really need to say it, you need to make sure it’s going to get that second look.
There certainly are contexts in which two adults can be on different “levels” and still be on a first name basis. Academia is not one. You will never go wrong calling someone “Prof. X” from the start. If they want you to use their first name, they’ll let you know. (Businesses tend to be like this also. It’s much easier to call your boss “Mr” or “Ms X” your first day and then get told “no, please, call me Rob”, than to try “Rob” first and get told “Actually I’d prefer you call me Mr X.”)
As far as who I am – I’m an assistant (“junior”) professor at a totally unrelated school who happened to see your site. I teach science, not accounting, but there’s similarities. If my name becomes relevant then I’ll post it.
“Life is a series of situations from which we learn lessons that we don’t have an opportunity to apply”.
Thank you for taking the time to comment and trying to help me not to come across as such an apparent jerk.
My best wishes to you and yours and good luck on all your future endeavors.
Yours Truly
jeff bellamy