Saturday, September 01, 2012

Harvard College


Richard Perz-Pena, Harvard Students in Cheating Scandal Say Collaboration Was Accepted (August 31, 2012) (snippets):

In years past, the course, Introduction to Congress, had a reputation as one of the easiest at Harvard College. Some of the 279 students who took it in the spring semester said that the teacher, Matthew B. Platt, an assistant professor of government, told them at the outset that he gave high grades and that neither attending his lectures nor the discussion sessions with graduate teaching fellows was [sic] mandatory.

“He said, ‘I gave out 120 A’s last year, and I’ll give out 120 more,’ ” one accused student said.

[snip, snip]

Harvard University revealed on Wednesday that nearly half of the undergraduates in the spring class were under investigation for suspected cheating, for working together or for plagiarizing on a take-home final exam. Jay Harris, the dean of undergraduate education, called the episode “unprecedented in its scope and magnitude.” 

[snip, snip]

An accused sophomore said that in working on exams, “everybody went to the T.F.’s and begged for help. Some of the T.F.’s really laid it out for you, as explicit as you need, so of course the answers were the same.”

He said that he also discussed test questions with other students, which he acknowledged was prohibited, but he maintained that the practice was widespread and accepted.

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But they're all above average, aren't they? Don't they all deserve As?
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Thursday, August 30, 2012

Ranking Heterogeneous Entities - such as Universities and Law Schools


Malcolm Gladwell, The Order of Things, New Yorker (Feb. 14, 2011). 
Gladwell discusses, inter alia, the difficulty of ranking Penn State and Yeshiva University with a single set of criteria. (In 2011 US News ranked Penn State 47th and Yeshiva University 50th.)
Are even faculty members "heterogeneous entities"? I suppose they are.

Would you rank Einstein above Beethoven or vice-versa? Which of the two is better or higher than the other?



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Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Jury Foreman in Samsung-Apple Trial Has a Smartphone-Related Patent!

Can the result in the Apple-Samsung patent trial stand?
The foreman said "that the intent was to send a message to Samsung that 'patent infringing is not the right thing to do.'"
But it turns out that the jury foreman "has a patent that could be used in smartphones."
 
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Evidence marshaling software MarshalPlan