TO THE EDITOR:
I have been intensely interested in the questions about UNC’s intellectual integrity as presented in recent sports scandals, the question of “grade inflation” and a man’s recent depiction of a vague “Carolina Way” in the (Raleigh) News & Observer.
It is my belief that if UNC is to have the ongoing reputation of the “Public Harvard of the South,” that that image requires almost constant attention to integrity. It seems to me that especially students and past students benefit from such a reputation and must assume the often nebulous role of its protection.
For example, if I were a student who attended more than three classes in a course where attendance is required, I would report to the professor another student who fails to show up as a “Failure” in his report(s) to class, recognizing doing so as a requirement of the honor code. Yet, I see the University allowing similarly irresponsible students to later sue it! When are the students exhibiting their integrity?
In the case of “grade inflation” at UNC, how do the medical schools choose their Morehead and Reynold’s Fellows, when “A” is the average grade of students there?
I attended Carolina from 1965-1973 for undergraduate and medical schools and would like to attach to this query the standards and expectations for those days. I would be quite interested to know how graduate schools are to objectively know the differences between the average and the exceptional students when the average grade today is as high as it is.
I remember the only time I had to use the Honor Code at UNC. A young man went through the cafeteria line at Lenoir Hall, picked up an apple and bit out of it and then put that apple back in the cafeteria line. I told him, “Pick up that apple and pay for it or leave this University.”
He paid for his apple, saying, “I can’t believe you are doing this!” But you see, if we don’t have a meaningful honor code that demands integrity, Carolina graduates will be viewed as the Rebecca Crawleys (as in Vanity Fair) of our state and nation, rather than as our President views Dean Smith.
The exhibition of integrity must be a daily characteristic, one that is developed unnaturally, and therefore exceptional, like the honorable Dean Smith.
