Friday, April 17, 2009
Quote Misuse
This has got to be the most terrifying and inappropriate distortion of a quote I have ever seen.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Paper Mills
A piece on Talk of the Nation this afternoon led me to this article on farming out your high school or college papers to outside companies that will write them for you. Good deal, no?
The radio piece focused (oddly, I thought) on the idea of guilt. Guilt on the part of students who hired the writers and guilt on the part of writers who did the work for them. Calls came in from both sides, explaining why they did what they did - not being defensive, necessarily, but all offering reasons for their actions.
I posit this: It is a strange phenomenon, and not one I was really aware of at all until today (besides other schoolmates offering the same). I have never written a school paper for anyone or paid to have one written for me, but I was nonetheless intrigued by the notion. This happens every day in the workplace, although we never talk about it.
Do CSO's write their own speeches, their own letters? Do Executive Director's write their own acknowledgments? Of course not. I am not claiming these two acts are one in the same, but I do find it interesting that we are so quick to condemn those that use these essay services (or those that do the work for them) when we all do this in our daily lives. It is almost a rite of passage. Whether a college student pays for a paper or not, one day (if they earn high enough marks, of course) they will most likely be sitting at a desk somewhere, signing documents and letters that they have never even seen.
It almost sounds to me like good practice for the future...
The radio piece focused (oddly, I thought) on the idea of guilt. Guilt on the part of students who hired the writers and guilt on the part of writers who did the work for them. Calls came in from both sides, explaining why they did what they did - not being defensive, necessarily, but all offering reasons for their actions.
I posit this: It is a strange phenomenon, and not one I was really aware of at all until today (besides other schoolmates offering the same). I have never written a school paper for anyone or paid to have one written for me, but I was nonetheless intrigued by the notion. This happens every day in the workplace, although we never talk about it.
Do CSO's write their own speeches, their own letters? Do Executive Director's write their own acknowledgments? Of course not. I am not claiming these two acts are one in the same, but I do find it interesting that we are so quick to condemn those that use these essay services (or those that do the work for them) when we all do this in our daily lives. It is almost a rite of passage. Whether a college student pays for a paper or not, one day (if they earn high enough marks, of course) they will most likely be sitting at a desk somewhere, signing documents and letters that they have never even seen.
It almost sounds to me like good practice for the future...
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