Word: proctors
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Dates: during 1910-1919
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...argument in favor of the honor system in conducting examinations seems to me to be based upon a mistaken view of the object of the present method of supervision by proctors. If the precise object of supervising written examinations is that of inculcating a sense of honor in the participants, there may be something said for banishing the proctor; and we may even welcome the evidence, which is doubtless trustworthy, that in some colleges where cheating has been rife and where there has been practically no public sentiment against it, the introduction of the honor system has apparently brought...
...presence of the proctor in the examination-room is no reflection on the honesty of the candidates, beyond what is involved in the undeniable fact that not all men are honest. In countless transactions of every day life men of unimpeachable honesty cheerfully submit to checks and restraints imposed by society on all for the fault of a few. None of us feel insulted at seeing policemen on the streets or watchmen in banks, nor do we take offense at being obliged to furnish proper identification on cashing cheques or opening a credit account. On the contrary, we regard these...
...cribbing is due to the puerile notion that the very presence of the proctor is an invitation to circumvent him, I doubt whether the honor system would result in any greater maturity of moral conceptions. To sign a statement at the end of an examination paper to the effect that he has not cheated should be infinitely more humiliating to a gentleman than to sit within view of a proctor, yet in some colleges, at least, the honor system encourages the view that such a signature is more binding than writing the name at the head of the paper...
...there are who will not admit that the honor System is a moral advance on the present method of proctor supervision. The reason that it has not been universally adopted is because many consider it too Utopian an advance, too impracticable for the present state of undergraduate morals; it is, say its opponents, a system which puts too much strain on the student; the average man is not yet fit to bear the responsibility. Still, they admit its value in theory. Therefore, being, as it is, an advance on an ancient and artificial scheme to prevent cheating, it should immediately...
...long as there are proctors in the examination-room there will always be a certain number of morally or mentally incapable men who will maintain that they have a perfect right to cheat if the proctor does not see them. The proctor is there to keep them from cheating, but if he is not quick enough to stop them they have used a legitimate right, they say. If the honor system were instituted at Harvard it would immediately change the present individual feeling against dishonesty, to an irresistible public spirit against it, as it has at Princeton and Williams...