Academic dishonesty

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 139412

Del wrote:
> What is being taught is the ability to successfully make a potion
*according to a certain protocol*. Simply having the students make
potions would be a waste of time and resources. Though the potions are
what is used to grade the students, they are not what really matters.
What matters is how good of a potion can the students make while
following a particular method. It's the *skill* the students develop
and demonstrate that matters, their ability to produce a certain
result under certain circumstances - including the method they are
given. So using another method makes the whole exercise worthless. 
> 
<snip> The ultimate point was *not* to have them make perfect potions,
even though that was what they were graded on. It was to have the kids
understand the interactions between the different ingredients and the
different moves.
> 
> By following the book's instructions precisely, Hermione worked on>
doing exactly that. She studied the theory on one hand, and she
applied it on the other hand, thus learning the innards of
potion-making. The fact that she is indeed learning the art of
potion-making is demonstrated during the antidote lesson. She appears
to be the only one who actually knows what she's doing, and that's
because she understands the principles of potion-making.
> 
> Harry, on the other hand, doesn't understand anything to
potion-making. He's just following another book's instructions, but he
doesn't gather anything from it. And when the antidote lesson comes,
he is completely at a loss, because he doesn't understand anything.
> 
<snip>
> When Harry decided to try the HBP corrections, it's because his
potion was not doing well already. It was *not* a case of getting a
passable potion by following the official instructions or trying to
get a better potion by following the modifications at the risk of
ruining the potion altogether. It was not a bet, Harry did not take
any risk because his potions were not going to be wonderful anyway. I
can accept that Harry took a small risk the first time or two times he
> tried the HBP modifications, but after that it wasn't a risk
anymore. And yet he kept being praised as though he had taken a risk
and won his bet.
> 
> Added to the fact that he never once understood *why* the
> modifications made the potions better (he couldn't, since he didn't
> even understand what was supposed to go on in the original method!),
> that does leave me pretty disgusted at the way he kept using the HBP
> ameliorations to get great grades. It was dishonest. He knew he didn't
> understand anything to potion-making, so he should have stuck to the
> original method, so that he could be fairly graded against his
> classmates. Using better recipes with the *only* intention of fooling
> his teacher and getting praises and great grades was deliberate
cheating.

Carol responds:
Excellent post, Del. I want to add one additional point. Young Severus
Snape deserved the highest possible marks in Potions because he
understood both the theory behind potion-making (which Hermione is
learning but Harry isn't) and how to apply it successfully (which
Hermione may be on her way to learning but Harry is not). If he were
to continue in this vein for another year and then take his Potions
NEWT, his ignorance of potion-making and the principles behind it
would be exposed, along with his less than honest method of acquiring
those marks. He has learned nothing. There is no possible way he could
reproduce those results (unless you count the bezoar) on his own. He
is being rewarded for Severus Snape's knowledge and creativity, not
his own. To argue that he deserves the same high marks as the person
who invented the improved potions makes no sense at all. It's like
saying that Lockhart deserves credit for writing his textbooks. The
only difference is that Harry hasn't modified anyone's memory in order
to claim their ideas as his own.

Even Harry knows that what he's doing is wrong or he wouldn't have
changed the cover on his borrowed textbook and kept it, disguised as
the new one, rather than turning it in to Slughorn. Nor would he have
hidden it from Snape and given him "Roonil Wazlib's" book, pretending
it was his own. He's cheating *and* lying, and he knows it. Otherwise
he would have argued with Snape and produced the book he had actually
been using. (And wouldn't *that* have been an interesting moment!)

The only person who deserved an O (or the classroom equivalent) for
those potions is the person who invented the improvements, young
Severus Snape.

Carol