We got back our complex deal exams in our lockers on Monday. I did pretty much what I expected to get. The scores ranged from a 24% to a 95% with a mean of 70%. One quarter of the class got an 80% or higher. I scored about one half a standard deviation below the mean. So it looks like we are on our way we are on our way to a P (pass).
The very interesting thing about the exam was not so much how I did on it but what I didn’t do. The three page exam was topped off with a cover page where we had to fill out information pertinent to the grading and the administration of the exam. There was a box to put down our name, section, locker and social security numbers, mother’s maiden name, political party affiliation, and name of church where we can be reached on a Sunday morning. Then there was a section where we had to sign our name verifying that the work was our own and we had plagiarized. I don’t have the exam in front of me so I can’t be specific but there was something about the verbiage (I believe it was written in past tense) that indicated that in order to be consistent with the spirit of what I was signing, I was not to sign the pledge until the very end of the exam. As you have probably guessed by now, after an hour and twenty five minutes of looking at balance sheets and income statements, I was so mentally out of shape that I handed in my paper without having signed the non-plagiarism clause. Surprisingly, the exam still got graded without my signature.
This reminded me of something that happened when I was in high school. We had to take a statewide exam and it had a similar pledge that had to be signed in order for it to be graded. At the beginning of the exam, the proctor went around the room making sure that everyone signed it before the exam’s commencement. When he got to my seat, I decided to become a smart aleck and pointed out that the exact wording was “I declare, at the conclusion of the exam, I had neither blah blah blah” His response was “just sign it.”
The response is quite revealing because if you think about it, there is no way you can declare that you have not cheated on an exam until you have finished taking it. His “just sign it” attitude indicates that he is not interested in the students making a credible pledge that they have not plagiarized. To him the pledge was nothing more than a box to be checked off so that a goal (grading the exam) could be achieved. I see a striking parallel between this man’s attitude and that of many Christians in America today in regards to their faith. We live in a country where an overwhelming majority claims to be of the Christian faith yet a majority of this majority considers their faith to be no more than a box to be checked off to fulfill a goal. That goal depends on the person. In some cases it is to fit in within a particular community (parents, in laws, circle of friends), to be considered a good person, etc. But many of the people that folks like me politely call “cultural Christians” hold no more of a belief in Christianity than that high school teacher has in the sanctity of the honor pledge.
I’d love to keep talking about this. I actually intended to write one more paragraph on how this mentality is linked to many of the accounting scandals we’ve covered in the accounting classes. But it is 1:30am and I have to do some research so that I can sound semi-intelligent tomorrow when representatives from the world’s largest software company come to Kenan-Flagler.
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