WHO WILL CHEAT THE CHEATERS?

In an industry like TESOL, particularly for expatriate teachers, one cannot survive without realising that many things are driven by local culture. No matter how dedicated, driven and diligent you are, no matter how much you care about educating your students and opening worlds for them, sometimes the local way of doing things simply overrides the foreigner’s judgement. Judging whether this is good or bad only leads to sleepless nights and white hair that I would rather devote to more worthy causes, like my students’ actual learning. At least, in theory.

The local way usually wins out, certainly wherever I have taught. In Oman it may involve more student collaboration than independent work, more guiding questions to ensure accurate reading of content, and of course the fact that people are always more important than facts, rules or information. This I have come to accept, and in some cases even adopt.

However, I am unwilling to accept the fact that when students cheat on exams, there are no consequences. This is absolutely unimaginable, particularly in a place where the great current drive is for “Quality Assurance” and accreditation. Apparently there is no understanding of the fact that accreditation will not be granted to institutions that do not control cheating.

During an invigilation yesterday I found a second year student copying from copious notes written on his left hand onto his exam paper. I alerted my co-invigilator to this, and we intercepted him. He immediately started wiping his hand clean, and moved it away when I tried to take a photograph with my phone, which was at the ready. Since there is no legal protection for teachers who intercept cheating, we had to allow him to finish his exam. When he finished, I confronted him, and he continued to deny everything, swearing profusely by God as is customary here.

When I returned the exam papers to the local course coordinator, he had already been to see her. She refused to even hear about the incident, and the cheater will go unpunished. This attitude makes me suspect that the majority of cheaters, in fact, even go uncaught, since local invigilators accept this practice. After all, that was how many of them got through college.

Although I will report this to the Quality Assurance committee, the local way is likely to win out once again. This hurts me more than I can even put into words. It is barely any consolation that accreditation will not be granted to an establishment where such incidents take place. It is also not much comfort that, ultimately, the nation is making decisions about the future of their own country in these seemingly insignificant actions. It appears that they really don’t understand the importance of academic integrity.

And much as I try to reason with myself that maybe honesty is a perverse form of cultural imperialism, I simply can’t swallow that one.

CONFERENCE JUNKIE!

At last my “big” presentation has come and gone, and with it, a whole new world of experience. This year, Oman’s ELT conference graduated to being “International”, and featured 88 sessions and near a thousand participants. It was so popular that on-site registrations could not be allowed, causing considerable disappointment for some. This is a pity, but as it was, the facilities were stretched to capacity.

What really impressed me was the atmosphere, which was friendly and collegial, even with such staggering numbers. This distinguishes Oman’s ELT conference from others in the region, and I hope it will remain this way.

Of course nothing makes you as aware of how nice people are, as actually presenting. Although I have taught every working day of my life for almost a decade and have presented before, it was my first time at such a big conference. (not to mention “international”…), and I was a little uneasy. Even so, the participants in the audience were so wonderfully welcoming that I soon forgot about this. I was caught somewhat unawares by the local tradition of poster presentations. At other conferences I have attended, poster presentations are more like an exhibition where you can have a discussion with the presenter. The poster remains on display throughout the event, but the presenter is only available for a limited time. Here, I was a little stunned to find that an actual presentation was the plan. I have lived and worked with the beginnings of this poster over several years, and have a great deal to say about it, but felt a little tongue-tied when suddenly confronted with it. I did have a structure PowerPoint presentation and handouts to use as a structure, but basically I wanted the poster to be the star of the show, not me. Having had far more attention than I had bargained for, I was relieved to hear that people did enjoy the presentation and really liked the poster. Which is nice, because in retrospective it is actually outrageously avant-garde for an esteemed conference.

The PowerPoint slides are (hopefully) attached here, with a picture of the poster in the background.