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Week 13: Project Update

So I had specified in a previous blog post the importance of understanding the authorship rules, for graduate students in graduate school. Many times these rules tend to be unclear, and this causes an issue. I’ve been working on getting all the information needed together, to be prepared to put together a final document. I’ve […]

Week 12: My Ethical Views

This week, we examined a lot of different ethical methodologies and views… And famous theories that somehow shape the ethics of everyday life. Some people gain their ethics through their moral values and beliefs. Others think it’s common sense, and doesn’t need a rocket scientist. Some people get inspired ethically from their religious beliefs. In […]

Week 11: Issues in Academics

Watching the two videos has been interesting. They speak a lot for the present situation in higher education, as it is presently!  The first video was interesting, in the sense that it highlighted the reality from student’s perspective. It spoke to important issues, such as class size, student debt, and many more. It’s actually interesting, […]

Week 10: Code of Ethics in Electrical Engineering

This week I examined the code of ethics for electrical engineering, or the IEEE Code of Ethics. I had examined this prior to this, for the Future Professoriate course, and wrote a blog post about it. This can be found here. However, I’m taking a fresh look at the Code of Ethics, and I’m blogging about it. Looking […]

Week 9: Copyright Laws and Creative Commons

This week’s post was about Copyright issues, and Creative Commons. I thought this is a very useful unit, especially for graduate students. This is particularly true, due to lack of sufficient knowledge, especially with graduate students working on their thesis or dissertation. This calls to a further more awareness of what the rules are, and […]

April 25, 2016

Week 13: Project Update

sarahre Academic Intergrity 0

So I had specified in a previous blog post the importance of understanding the authorship rules, for graduate students in graduate school. Many times these rules tend to be unclear, and this causes an issue. I’ve been working on getting all the information needed together, to be prepared to put together a final document. I’ve been researching different disciplines in a random sense. At first, I thought there wasn’t a huge difference between disciplines. Then, I found that there was significant difference between the strictness of certain fields. I found that interesting.

The second part to this, was pinning down what number of fields are satisfactory to cover all the parts of VT. After all, it would be difficult to have the rules for every single major at VT. However, I can get to as close as I can with something as similar as something else would be. For example, one engineering may be enough… Or I’ll list all engineering majors and state the differences, etc. Although, I’m sure I don’t know all the majors at VT.

Next, another challenge is giving my sources credit. It is difficult to do this in a brochure format, especially that fine print in cases like this can be too small to be read. Also, another concern I’m having, while working on this, is embodying all the majors, and letting people know that these are the “official requirements”. However, sometimes people stray away from these initial requirements.

Last but not least, I’ve always been compelled to research self-plagiarism.  I felt like it’s a compelling topic, because many tend to overlook that it exists… However, it is detrimental to avoid self-plagiarism. I’m unsure if I’ll have sufficient time to do this or not, but I’ve been really interested, least said!

April 25, 2016

Week 12: My Ethical Views

sarahre Academic Intergrity 0

This week, we examined a lot of different ethical methodologies and views… And famous theories that somehow shape the ethics of everyday life. Some people gain their ethics through their moral values and beliefs. Others think it’s common sense, and doesn’t need a rocket scientist. Some people get inspired ethically from their religious beliefs. In fact, some people follow the rules and regulations of society. Everyone has a unique formation of their ethical views, and are driven by it according to who they are. However, due to a large variety of backgrounds, and people the ethical rules are placed on ethical societies.

In my personal view, we are all influenced by the families we are brought up in, our religious views, and our place in the midst of society. In fact, the way we deal with ethics is influenced somewhat by our friends and those around us. There is a mixture of both. I think that i personally have a heavier mix of the morals and values I was brought up on,  my religious teachings, and societal norms. A lot of times, ethics comes as common sense to me. Sometimes I feel like we are made with this indicator that helps us establish right from wrong, based on a judgement. Also, in my experience, many times, people act in an ethical way or lack thereof because they wanna look good in a click or with their friends. However, usually it’s a good idea not to let peer pressure affect people in situations like these.

However, I do greatly appreciate the codes of Ethics. When people have different backgrounds, the codes of ethics make them stand on even footing and have the same fair chance. Nonetheless, it’s wonderful to have a strong ethical background, and to be ready to face the world essentially.

April 25, 2016

Week 11: Issues in Academics

sarahre Academic Intergrity 0

Watching the two videos has been interesting. They speak a lot for the present situation in higher education, as it is presently!  The first video was interesting, in the sense that it highlighted the reality from student’s perspective. It spoke to important issues, such as class size, student debt, and many more. It’s actually interesting, and it felt so familiar. It was an interesting expression through signs shown by students. This was the first video.

The second video, was called “Declining by Degrees: Higher Education at Risk” which can be found here. This is an interesting documentary about higher education, that was shown on PBS. I thought I’d just watch some of this documentary, and blog… However, it’s just a really interesting documentary, and it is true.

It’s quite shocking, when you hear about how personality types affect people’s success in college. And how people need to learn more about the resources available from the very beginning. It’s necessary to show people these resources. The documentary starts out with people who dropped out of college, because they didn’t have access to the resources necessary from the beginning. It’s sad to see freshmen dropping out, just because they needed more support or encouragement. It’s sad to see that matters of grade inflation and lack of communication of resources affect people’s enrollment. It’s sad that people worry about student retention by curving, rather than finding a way to help students to learn.

I liked how a portion of the documentary also focused on how to be a good teacher, and what things teachers do aren’t good. At the same time, I thought it was an amazing way to use the teleprompters for students to transmit answers to classes. And how they create discussions in the classroom in the midst of a huge lecture hall, and how people interact, despite the class setup. I thought that was neat. Also, living and learning communities in colleges also heavily impact students, and I thought that was great!

It was also interesting that they discussed the tenure track, and the risks people face… And how teaching to students, and how it affects students… Also, how teachers cut corners… and how they’re paid less than football coaches… So much in there that needs to be fixed!

There are a numerous amount of topics in this documentary that make it draining in a sense. Sometimes you wish you had a magical wand, to fix all the problems in higher education…  However, every faculty member has the ability to improve the world, and make things better… Make higher education as ideal as possible. I think students really need encouragement, support, and innovative ways to teach!

April 25, 2016

Week 10: Code of Ethics in Electrical Engineering

sarahre Academic Intergrity 0

This week I examined the code of ethics for electrical engineering, or the IEEE Code of Ethics. I had examined this prior to this, for the Future Professoriate course, and wrote a blog post about it. This can be found here. However, I’m taking a fresh look at the Code of Ethics, and I’m blogging about it.

Looking at the IEEE Code of ethics, it is clear that Ethics are a high priority for Electrical Engineers. A lot of the list of the code ethics are things of what appears to be Common Sense, for someone who has some extent of morals and values.  For example, it should be really obvious that one should worry for the well-being of others, and guard their well-being with their life. This is particularly true, especially with the products engineers make. In addition, it should be clear that bribes are wrong, especially in a professional setting.

When looking at the code of conducts this time around, I was impressed by the duty I have as an Electrical Engineer, especially from the respect in which is mentioned in the code of conduct. I was surprised that part of my duty is to help “improve the understanding of technology”.  That’s both surprising and impressive in my view. I love spreading technological knowledge, so I loved that! Also, to give, take, and appreciate criticism is part of the code of conduct.. And I think that’s great, especially when there are whistle blowers at time. They can directly approach people doing the wrong things, rather than taking a random approach to overcoming issues in a work environment. Also, there is a necessity of helping people become more competent with their engineering skills. In other words, I wouldn’t be doing my colleague a favor by helping him or her. Instead, it is a duty. I love that about the code of ethics.

Also, it seems like it’s always important to add that prejudice and preset biases are to be kept away from the professional life. And that one should not discriminate due to any thing regarding the individual’s color, faith, race, etc. I understand this is an important part to always have in Codes of Ethics… Until the world lacks prejudice one day soon.

Great 2nd pass through the code of ethics for Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers! Thanks for this!

 

 

April 25, 2016

Week 9: Copyright Laws and Creative Commons

sarahre Academic Intergrity 0

This week’s post was about Copyright issues, and Creative Commons. I thought this is a very useful unit, especially for graduate students. This is particularly true, due to lack of sufficient knowledge, especially with graduate students working on their thesis or dissertation. This calls to a further more awareness of what the rules are, and what is necessary to abide by them.

Copyright laws and fair use is something very commonly heard of, especially in academia. Once someone enters a college or university, they’re subjected to parts of books under fair use. And this is very common. Nonetheless, it doesn’t always mean that people that people should take a ton of information out of a book for fair use. I think common sense is sometimes necessary, as well as knowledge of the laws.

As for the laws, one should be aware of them, and understand them. The Virginia Tech website titled Can I use it? expresses this greatly, and shows the rules and regulations greatly and clearly. This is very important to be aware of. In fact, the Virginia Tech Library website provides good resources for the copyright laws.

The most enjoyable part of this unit for me was learning about Creative Commons. Creative Commons, is a really brilliant idea that’s built off of the fact that people should share information together. Creative Commons allows people to choose the copy rights for their material according to the way the author makes it fit. However, there should be some type of leniency with how much people can do with it.  I played with Creative Commons for a bit, and I love how it’s clear to figure out what can be used and what can’t be used. I thought it was great.

I think this will be a useful resource once one begins to teach in academia, etc. Wonderful week! Thank you!

April 9, 2016

Week 8: Final Project Ideas

sarahre Academic Intergrity 0

This week’s post for academic integrity, regard choosing the topic that will be pursued in my final project. The area of authorship in academic integrity has been kind of intriguing to me. I just realized how there are so many rules all over, and in different fields. I also was really shocked that you can plagiarize yourself… Using your own words…

There are two topics in mind right now regarding academic integrity, that are of interest for me. First, could be regarding the authorship rules, and how it varies in fields… And how people can be more conscientious of these rules… And stop doing others favors and making them authors. I think this is something general graduate students don’t have in mind, and in fact some violate these without realizing they’re violating an important rule….

The second topic that’s of interest to me is about plagiarizing oneself. I’m interested in learning more about the rules of using your own work after it’s been published. In fact, recently I was in the middle of a discussion that required using figures previously published by some of the authors, and work that wasn’t published… The main authors were trying to figure out how to get permission, and also give credit to those with unpublished work that didn’t contribute directly to their paper, but instead were contributors to something not directly related.. Watching their entangled discussion, I felt that had I published before or had expertise to the area, I could give my 10 cents about it.. So I wanted to gain knowledge in the area…

So those are the two areas I’m considering for my final project. I’ll narrow it down to one of those two soon… Or maybe I’ll do both briefly…

March 21, 2016

A Rant on Graduate School!

sarahre Contemporary Pedagogy 18

Many times in life, we go into classes not knowing what to expect. Sometimes, after the first class, we learn to expect to master a list of requirements for the course. Those classes either have an engaging professor who can grab our attention… or they don’t. That’s usually the story of most classes.

*Unless* you go into a class, and you find the professor explaining to you WHAT this can do for the REAL WORLD. Many of us expect to have some type of a positive impact on the real world. So, let me ask this, how many of you got really really passionate about something you learned in a course just because of all the amazing applications for it? How often did you ever have classes that you looked forward to? How often did you not have classes you dreaded going to in undergrad? I know this is a rare occurrence and all, but sometimes, there are those rare professors who can get their students to look forward to being there. I think a lot of these people follow Freirean ideology on education. These people encourage their students to relate what they’re learning to the world. These people guide students to leave an amazing foot print. These people scaffold their students into always being curious. Freire was a true believer of pursuing curiously. This video is a wonderful idea of how he encouraged great curiosity.

Many times, graduate students get impatient sometimes because they don’t get the results they want in research. In fact, sometimes, advisers advise in certain directions, and request that work is done a certain way. However, if we set our curiosity free, and share our curious ideas with our advisers, maybe we’ll make great victories.

If I’m interpreting my world in Freire’s view as was in the presentation, risking is the backbone to reading the world in our research and our living. If we risk, try hard, risk, try hard, risk… And Embrace EVERY failure…. We’ll be on to the next Noble Prize. At least that’s how I see it.  Just gotta be patient!  🙂

March 16, 2016

Week 7: Who Should be an author on that paper?

sarahre Academic Intergrity 0

It is clearly evident, that authorship rules vary from discipline to discipline. However, some things about authorship are clear, and aren’t that difficult to be followed. First of all, an author of a paper has to actually contribute to the paper. Someone who didn’t do anything for the sake of the paper shouldn’t get authorship on it. That’s first and foremost. Second, students shouldn’t put random authors on their paper because they’ve done them a favor before. That’s just not right. Third, if someone works on a team but didn’t contribute to a paper, they can’t also be an author. It doesn’t make sense.

Evidently, when I began this section, all I could think of was Dean DePauw’s advice in last semester’s course about authorship. If different folks are working on a paper, they should agree on who deserves authorship and how to divide the work.  In addition, based on the division of work, one should know who deserves first authorship versus third authorship. Some disciplines require authors to both contribute intellectually and to the written product in order to get authorship. In ECE many times the first author is the one who writes the paper. At the same time he or she contributes the most to the material formulated.  Anyone who contributed to the intellectual product should be considered an author.

Authorship is a complicated topic, because academia has a lot of different fields that handle this topic differently. One may be in a field that puts names on papers in alphabetical order as stated here. Disciplines treat authorship differently, and this should be taken in mind. This complicates the issue greatly. I recall a medicine article last semester which required all the authors to contribute to the writing and the intellectual property in the paper. This is essential for a good paper in medicine.

When thinking about the arts, they don’t exactly have an issue with plagiarism per say. They allow people to copy and take info from each other. That is different than a lot of fields. Or you would thinks so until you realize that “Everything is a Remix”. 

When you consider the “Everything is a Remix” concept, you realize that everyone is picking up info from other people in other disciplines. The difference is they’re giving other people credit in the form of citations, or in the form of credits on a movie or so. I think it’s all the same, but how others are acknowledged differs, essentially.

So long as integrity and fairness is mastered , authorship can be mastered as well.

February 28, 2016

What part of the Circle are you Staring at?

sarahre Contemporary Pedagogy 7

Being Inclusive in the academia. This is a very important and sensitive topic. I’d like to start with an idea, that’s greatly heard of, but not always applied. Once upon a time there were two circles. The two circles had unique aspects to them, and the two circles also had similarities. When trying to coexist with one another, they had a terrible time whenever they kept exploiting their differences.  However, once they began looking at their similarities, they realized they overlapped. There was this lovely space where both of them were comfortable, and they felt at home. This space was the overlapping space of their circles. This overlapping space is similar to the similarities found between any two humans. They could focus on their differences, or a lot better, focus on their similarities and coexist peacefully.

In the modern day, everyone is supposed to have equal rights. However, as Shankar Vedantam mentioned in the interview with NPR titled “How ‘The Hidden Brain’ Does The Thinking For Us“, he mentions how many people have preset biases that form, even in 3 year-olds. These preset biases don’t allow the world to be fair, and don’t allow people equal opportunities if and only if they take their biases to the next level. In other words, if someone acts on their biases, the outcome usually isn’t too great. At the same time, if an environment is diverse, inclusive, includes both genders– the company is more successful, and makes more revenue as mentioned here. That is huge, that diversity can do such wonderful things for a company, and increase it’s revenue.

In thinking about being inclusive, there are many people who stand out and don’t always face the warmest environment. People face profiling due to their skin color, religion, age, race, and many more. Some of this, I strongly believe has a strong association with the media. The media plays a huge role in creating biases and judgement towards races. They can totally portray people in a way that lacks reality. Unfortunately, human nature is that people are generally afraid of what they don’t know or don’t understand. So many times, people may be afraid of others even more because the media said something bad about it. However, this doesn’t end except through awareness. Awareness and the spread of intellect is the way to get people to be more inclusive and welcoming to differences.

The most inclusive environment in America is the academia. It is more inclusive than the real world, and more inclusive than industry. The academia isn’t perfect, but it’s better than what the world has to carry. And the better the academia becomes, the more there will be hope for the real world and other institutions that are not academic.

To be more inclusive in the academia and in the real world we must respect our differences. We must not shed excessive light on these differences. Instead, we should respect the differences. We should always look for what we have in common with others, rather than what’s different (or what we aren’t comfortable with). When we do that, we will be facilitating a more inclusive environment. We will look for similarities, and a peaceful life– rather than focus on differences which could lead to conflict.

So are you focusing on where the circles overlap?!

 

February 25, 2016

Week 6: Citation Software and the Selfie creating a Lawsuit

sarahre Academic Intergrity 0

This week’s readings and work has been quite entertaining for me. I was fascinated by the Monkey’s Selfie this week’s module began with, and the lawsuit for the monkey to claim rights, rather than the photographer. Since the Monkey took the Selfie. However, in my view, I kind of think that both the monkey and the photographer should have rights to the photo. For two reasons. First of all, the monkey definitely couldn’t of set up the camera on his own. He probably doesn’t even own a camera. So he couldn’t of done it without a camera, and without the photographer. Secondly, the photographer didn’t take the selfie himself. The monkey did. So I think they should have equal rights to the photo. At least that’s my speculation on the whole topic. However, I like the fact that if the monkey gets rights to the picture, this will help improve their habitat, and help reduce extinction. Anyways, all the details and information referenced above can be found in the article named “Should a Monkey own a Copyright?”, which can be found here.

Secondly, I really enjoyed the citation tools discussed in this module. I’ve been using EndNote since I was an undergrad. I love it. I love the convenient technique in Google Scholar that allows the citation to be pulled into EndNote directly. In fact, the plug-in can be linked to Microsoft Word, and as one is writing you can cite something in text. This, in my view, is very useful, and is wonderful. However, it costs money after one graduates. This is really difficult to sustain in the real world. Not just that, but I heard that VT won’t support EndNote in the future. Here’s the reference on Virginia Tech’s website saying that.

At the same time, Zotero, is known to play the same role as EndNote. It’s something everyone has been recommending instead of EndNote, especially that EndNote’s access will end sometime soon. We have about 1 year and a few months left for EndNote, or whenever we graduate–Whichever comes first. I read a little bit about Zotero, and realized it may have a little bit of issues with IEEE and the way it does that citation style… But for a free citation program, definitely can’t complain. Especially that it has a firefox plugin as mentioned online, to allow pulling data out to ease out the citation process.

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