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OPINION
March 20, 2008 • THE ARROW
What’s on Your iPod?
DENA GALLUCCI
JESSICA KANE
STAFF WRITERS
Students Rock Rock to the Top
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We’ve heard the phrase
“cheaters never prosper,” even
before any methods of cheating
were possible. Currently, the
amount of cheating world-wide
has hit an all-time high, whether
it be in middle school, high
school, or colleges.
Six students were expelled
and nearly a dozen others faced
suspension after an unethical
cheating scandal that has greatly
demoralized the elite HarvardWestlake, a Los Angeles private
school with a prestigious reputation.
An assembly on Feb. 26, on
the school’s North Hollywood
campus announced the outcome
of the nearly three-week long investigation by the school’s honor
board. The expulsions of the six
students were issued and the remaining dozen were suspended
for varying lengths of time.
The students were accused
of stealing and revealing the
final exams of Spanish 3, World,
and European History classes.
The history department became
suspicious when several of the
students did exceptionally well,
and someone soon tipped the
department that cheating had
occurred.
Administrators said that
the six sophomores conspired to
distract the teachers and steal the
exams in their classrooms, and
the tests were viewed by about
12 others.
At a school that is so intense
and where so much is expected of
the students, many did not find
the students’ cheating shocking.
As pressure levels rise and the
drive to be perfect continues,
many students feel like there is
no other way to succeed than to
cheat.
This easily can be reflected at
our own school, since everyone
is aware that cheating occurs in
almost every classroom, almost
every single day. Cheating has
become an epidemic that some
administrators are constantly trying to end, but as technology becomes more accessible and teachers become more lenient, cheating
becomes much more accepted in
a high school atmosphere.
“It’s also an issue of morality. In my opinion, if someone
feels that it’s okay to cheat on
a homework assignment and
misrepresents his or her work, it
0
In a recent survey, 200 WHS students showed that they prefer rock music over all other
genres.
can transfer into other areas of his
or her life. For example, lying to
parents and friends can become
easier,” said Dean of Activities
Nicole Funfar.
Gregory Ramey, PhD. and
child psychologist at Dayton
Children’s Medical Center, revealed that a study taken 50 years
ago that suggested only 20% of
students cheated, compared to
78% of high school students that
admit to cheating today. However, this statistic is incorrect,
since many students will not
admit to cheating. Another 40%
of students believe that cheating,
plagiarizing, lying, or resorting to
violence are sometimes necessary
to succeed.
“At our school, we follow a
strict Academic Honesty Policy
that is stated in the student handbook,” said Principal Ron Lipari,
which includes an automatic F
on the assignment for the first
offense, and a drop-fail from the
class for the second offense.
“Everyone tries to cut
corners, but cheating is just an
opportunity to skirt the significance of hard work. It’s not only
cheating in the classroom, it’s
also cheating yourself and you
get nothing from it.”
Teachers have tried to eliminate this problem by offering two
or more different versions of tests
or by double checking homework
to be sure that one student has
not duplicated another’s work,
but with text messaging, the
internet, and iPods, it is getting
more and more difficult to weed
out the cheaters.
The editor of Harvard-Westlake’s well-known school newspaper, The Chronicle, Michael
Kaplan ‘08, wrote a personal
opinion piece titled, “Cheaters
should be expelled,” on his online
blog, sparking much controversy
among parents and students who
read it.
“I’ve been at the school for
21 years and I have never heard
of an exam or test being stolen,”
said Harvard-Westlake President
and former headmaster, Thomas
Hudnut. He also noted that he
was extremely disappointed that
many of the students did not
come forward earlier to report
the cheating that occurred.
The annual tuition at
Harvard-Westlake is $25,000.
Unfortunately for those select
parents, their money and future
plans for their children went
completely down the drain.
Schools Not Offering Enough Humanity Studies
KIMBERLY HA
OPINION EDITOR
The CAHSEE tests, also
known as the High School Exit
Exam, was administered March
11. Students have a 90% pass rate
for English-language arts (ELA)
and mathematics test.
So the issue here is either the
students are ridiculously smart
or the test is ridiculously easy.
Unfortunately, the same cannot
be said about the rest of the nation.
Common Core, an education-advocacy group, conducted
a survey of 12,000 17-year-old
high-school students asking questions pertaining to history and literature that a high-schooler is expected to know. The entire test
consisted of 33 multiple choice
questions; the average score was
67% answered correctly.
When was the Civil War?
(Answer: 1850 – 1900) Who was
Adolf Hitler? (Answer: The
Chancellor of Germany during
the Second World War) These
were some of the questions that
were on the test which students
did poorly on, 43% and 77% right
respectively. Curious to know
how you stand? The test is available at http://commoncore.org/
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Met
R&B Coun
Cheating Poses New Challenges
JESSICA KANE
STAFF WRITER
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GRAPHIC BY DENA GALLUCCI AND JESSICA KANE
“So what kind of music do you listen
to?” The answer to this common icebreaker
should be simple, but most people are fidgety at the subject because they are afraid of
being judged based on what they have on
their iPods.
It is a known fact to teens that music can
define part of someone’s identity. It is used
as common ground between new and old
friends or even acquaintances.
By sharing an interest in a band or artist, two people have an immediate connection and similarity.
Results of a survey conducted of 200
WHS students proved that many conform or
pretend to like the music that they know will
not be critiqued by their peers. Bands like
Paramore, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Jack Johnson, The Fray, and Radiohead were the most
common responses.
The survey simply asked students their
favorite artists and genres of music giving
options for only genres, not favorite bands.
Results are shown on the right.
Students usually sway with the crowd:
only 50% of the answered surveys didn’t
have one of the eight most popular bands
written on it.
Clearly, the opinions of others have an
enormous influence and factor on the music
we listen to, or it’s just a coincidence that so
many people enjoy the same bands. However, there are exceptions.
Austin Asano ‘09 said that he likes to
listen to screamo for the “riffs” and “because
it brings out an emotion that I feel inside that
may be scary to some people, but to me it’s
just where I’m at.”
Victoria Fealkoff ‘10 said she chose
country as her favorite genre “because I can
relate a lot of the lyrics to my life.”
Obvious errors appeared on the tally
sheets of the survey results. If people consider a group to be their favorite, how is it possible that they spell its name wrong? Some
of the extremes included “Girls Like Boys,”
“The Beetles,” and “The Frey.”
While observing the students who completed the surveys, we noticed that many
asked for advice about what to write and
were uneasy as their survey was passed forward, even though they were aware the survey was anonymous. Another 41 individuals
submitted blank surveys.
WHS students heavily favor rock and
alternative music over any other genre. A total of 87% of those surveyed said that they
prefer listening to these two genres, while
less than 8% said they listen to country.
Asking people what their favorite band
is should be a simple question, but in a high
school environment that judges constantly, it
isn’t. So ask yourself, what kind of music do
you listen to?
_docs/CCreport_stillatrisk_
quiz.pdf.
Common Core’s conclusion is that the results “serve as
a wake-up call to remind us that
it is vital to address more than
one educational challenge at a
time,” alluding to the standardized-testing emphasis on reading and mathematics that the
“No Child Left Behind” law enforces on schools at the expense
of the study of humanities. With
so much time focused on the basics, less time is available for other enriching subjects so that music, liberal arts, and science are
neglected. While certain areas
suffer, students lack a complete
education.
Instead the school year
becomes a race to cram students
with the materials necessary to
prepare them for the various
end-of-year-exams: STAR testing,
APs, finals, etc. How effective
those testing methods are,
however, varies. The results of
the Common Core report indicate
that more resources should be
invested into the arts to ensure
a well-balanced education. The
need for reading and mathematics
is no less important, but it is
evident that some American
teenagers are being left behind.
THE WESTLAKE HIGH SCHOOL
ARROW
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