Fatal Flaws of a Fault-Finding Framework

Welcome to the Agglomeration

Today I would like to blog on something that has happened in my life. A mixture of current events and my life, so I guess that makes 70% of my readers happy (this statistic correct at the time of this post with reference to the poll).

The specific topic of this post concerns an addition made by the Board of Studies in 2007 that concerns all students wanting to complete an HSC. It is a compulsory initiative called 'All My Own Work', and let me tell you now, this is perhaps the most aimless and meaningless facade that the Board of Studies could've developed to make an impression that they're actively trying to do something. Is the impression real? Yes it is. Does the initiative actually do anything? Absolutely not. Let me explain by outlining some of the fatal flaws of this newly introduced program.

1. The Nomenclature

'All My Own Work' is a completely stupid and non-applicable name for this program. Not only does it not reflect what the program is trying to teach (which is how to properly acknowledge and cite sources of research, thereby making components of your literary piece or artwork or whatever contain influences of the work of other people and making therefore my logical extension your own not exclusively your own) but judging by how the program is carried out, it might as well better be called 'All My Own Ability To Answer Extremely Obvious Questions With My Surplus Of Common Sense Repeatedly Until I Am Able To Get A Mark Of Eighty Percent Or More'. As an acronym, 'AMOATAEOQWMSOCSRUIAATGAMOEPOM' totally blows 'AMOW' out of the water.

2. The Aim

The Board of Studies introduced this program to advocate scholarly practices and advise students against malpractice, opting instead for a path of honesty and integrity lined with extremely pretty pink flower petals. However, this isn't something that needs to be 'taught'. It should've and has been incorporated into the syllabus since late primary school. The skills of citation, referencing and so on can easily be integrated into all the subjects they're actually relevant to in Years 7-10 at least. And that's all of them. So why we need a separate pointless program that acheives nothing but make the Board of Studies look like a group that either has way too much time on their hands and needs to fill it up by inventing redundant schemes or lacks the intellectual capacity to develop something that actually works or a group of fascists that simply wants to sabotage the NSW education system.

3. The Structure

What this program basically consists of is 5 modules:


1. Scholarship Principles and Practices
2. Acknowledging Sources
3. Plagiarism
4. Copyright
5. Working with others

(Taken from http://amow.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/) --> See? I'm learning...

Moving on, each module contains:

1. Information and advice on the module focus questions
2. Quiz questions
3. Summary
4. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
5. Link to a glossary
6. Links to relevant websites.

(Again taken from http://amow.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/) --> Further citation superiority from me here.

However, the only important part of any of this is the quiz. What one has to go to 'pass' the program is achieve 80% or more in each of the quizzes of the modules. So essentially that is reading comprehension, probably one of the only skills you'll get out of it. If at all. See, I attempted the quizzes without bothering to read the material at all. And I managed to get 100% in 3 of the modules, and 96% in the other 2 (getting only one question wrong in each) first try.

See, the problem with the questions is that most of them are incredibly obvious. There are 3 types of questions: True or False, Cloze Passage, and 2 Option Multi Guess.

Here's a sample question: Plagiarism is a type of cheating. True of False?

Now any person with half a red sponge for a brain and a metal rod for a finger could answer that correctly.

Furthermore, if one scores less than 80% on the first try, they can try again. Repeatedly. For an unlimited amount of times. Seriously, what is the point of this? Now the only skill that is being tested is one's memory. And guess what else was being tested while I did this test? My patience! For most good quizzes, when you answer a question correctly there is usually a statement that provides extra information to help you learn more about what you just answered correctly or incorrectly, as the case may be. Instead, the Board of Studies opts for the conventional and widely tested, 'Since they're too stupid to be right even when they're right because they must be guessing and so we have to state the obvious for those simple minded idiots' approach.

For the above sample question, when one answers 'True', the following statement pops up:

'Yes, that is correct. Plagiarism is a form of cheating'. Are you sure, Board of Studies? Don't you think there is a possibility that the answers could've changed or we might've forgotten it in the split second between we chose the answer, clicked the 'check answer' and your statement popped up? So, not only is this test a COMPULSORY waste of time, you're also in for a session to get your intelligence insulted by the very people who are going to set the tests that will likely decide your future within 2 years.

In the end you're going to have to comply with this tyrannous suppression of free will, but at least we don't have to pretend we like it. The next thing we know, the Board of Studies will be devising programs to teach us about drawing margins, document setup, acceptable computer use, examination protocol, subject selection, university courses, and how to use printers. And even if were forced to do all of these, it wouldn't be worse than the epitomy of governmental failure that is 'All their own Work'.

To conclude, a poll, which obviously won't be featured every post, as evidenced by their absence in the past two posts.

Not-so-Postly Poll #2 - Should executive salaries be capped in light of the recent events concerning 'Pacific Brands'?

Comment below.

Till next time, may you agglomerate all your unpremeditated contemplations.