Research Blog #10: Abstract & Bibliography

Abstract

My paper explores the underlying causes of the fact that international students, especially Chinese students in American colleges tend to commit more to unethical academic behavior such as cheating and plagiarism. The Neutralization Theory can help explain part of the issue. Due to lack of school support, international students find it easier apply some of the "neutralizing techniques" to help rationalize and justify certain unethical behavior, especially when they are confronted with tremendous challenges caused by language deficiencies. Consequently, the possibility of conducting unethical academic behavior is much higher among the group of international students. Nevertheless, my paper also argues that there is complexity in terms of the fact that Chinese students are more likely to conduct unethical academic behavior. The Neutralization Theory lacks cultural consideration in the way that there is a cultural identity separateness and different education systems in Asian societies. Both reasons force international students to have motives to cheat and plagiarize alleged in American colleges. Therefore, instead of relying on international students to help with funding, American colleges may reconsider the circumstances of international students and devote more resources to understand their culture in order to ensure them a smooth cultural transition process.


Bibliography


Brent, Edward, and Curtis Atkisson. "Accounting For Cheating: An Evolving Theory And Emergent Themes." Research In Higher Education 52.6 (2011): 640-658. Academic Search Premier. Web. 15 Nov. 2015.


Curasi, Carolyn F. "The Relative Influences Of Neutralizing Behavior And Subcultural Values On Academic Dishonesty." Journal Of Education For Business 88.3:167-175. (2013). Teacher Reference Center. Web. (Nov. 2015).


Douglass, John Aubrey. “International Berkeley: Enrolling International Students Yesterday and Today, Debates on the Benefits of Multicultural Diversity, and Macro Questions on Access and Equity.” Research & Occasional Paper Series: CSHE.3.14. March, 2014. Web.


Fischer, K. “Colleges adapt to new kinds of students from abroad: Younger, sometimes less-experienced students require more academic and social support.” The Chronicle of Higher Education (2011). Web.


Lewin, T. “Taking more seats on campus, foreigners also pay the freight.” The New York Times. Feb, 2012. Web.


NAFSA: Association of International Educators. “The economic benefits of international students to the U.S. economy academic year 2011-2012.” (2012). Web.


Ota, Akiko, "Factors Influencing Social, Cultural, and Academic Transitions of Chinese International ESL Students in U.S. Higher Education." Dissertations and Thesis. Paper 1051. (2013). Web.


Rauhala, Emily, and Gu Yongqiang. "China's Big Test." Time 185.13 (2015): 36. MAS Ultra - School Edition. Web. 16 Nov. 2015.


Reisberg, L. “Why do we want international students?” Inside Higher Ed. July, 2012. Web.


Sykes, G., & Matza, D. “Techniques of neutralization: A theory of delinquency.” American Sociological Review, 22, 664–670. (1957). Web.


Zhai, L. “Studying international students: Adjustment issues and social support. Journal of international agricultural and extension education.” 11(1), 98-104. (2004). Web.

Literature Review #5--China's Big Test.

1. Works Cited

Rauhala, Emily, and Gu Yongqiang. "China's Big Test." Time 185.13 (2015): 36. MAS Ultra - School Edition. Web. 25 Nov. 2015.

2. This article explores the underlying reasons in terms of the recent SAT cheating scandal in China, the author points out that the reality is more complex for Chinese students to commit to alleged cheating due to China's education system. In mainland China, cases of test fraud are everywhere in press because the competition is just so intense for China's college entrance exam, namely the "gaokao". Parents and students acquire the mindset that if they do not search for "easier" ways in order to earn higher scores on the exam, they are being placed at an unfair position. China's "authoritarian" system--a single test that determines a student's future also substantially contributes to alleged cheating. Therefore, the education system somewhat forces Chinese students to constantly outperform each other. In the case for Chinese students who study abroad, Rauhala ad Gu argue that language is still a huge problem for them. Chinese students are capable of earning high scores on TOEFL and SAT tests but they still find it very difficult to have face-to-face conversations with their American peers. According to Miao, a student at Wisconsin Madison, "her classmates used words that they don't teach at TOEFL prep and spoke so quickly that it was hard to keep up at first" (Rauhala&Gu, 41). Therefore, by exploring the roots of cheating, we see that China's education system plays a significant role in causing the situation. The Neutralization Theory thus can only help explain half of the story.

3. Quotes

1) "Outraged at the special supervision, more than 2,000 people, mostly parents, gathered near the exam hall, trapping investigators inside. Their rallying cry: “It’s not fair unless we cheat.” Parents were so desperate for high scores, and so convinced that everyone else was cheating, that they saw fraud as the only way to level the playing field".

2) "For some 2,000 years, jobs in the highly regarded civil service were awarded to
those who performed best on nationwide exams. The tests were faulted for promoting a narrow type of learning but had the benefit of being fairly meritocratic. In theory, they offered students the chance to improve their lives".

3) "Elite institutions like Beijing’s Peking and Tsinghua universities reserve
more spaces for applicants from the capital, putting candidates from the provinces
at a further disadvantage".

4) "Even for an adventurer like Miao, American college life was a shock. Her
English scores were excellent, but her classmates used words that they don’t teach at TOEFL prep and spoke so quickly that it was hard to keep up at first. In Chinese high schools, she says, the teacher talked and students listened and memorized. Her social-science classes at Madison
were all about crafting arguments and participating in debate".

Research Blog #9: Argument and Counter-Argument.

My research argues that since American colleges aggressively recruit international students by viewing it as a lucrative business, it leads to that they are reluctant to devote resources in order to fully understand cultural differences. This causes the majority of international students, especially Chinese students face more challenges academically. Therefore, it is a potential reason that international students are more likely to conduct academic unethical behavior such as cheating and plagiarizing during exams.

The Neutralization Theory can partly explain the phenomenon since some international students may use one of the "Neutralizing Techniques" to justify cheating and plagiarizing. For example, they may view that they should not be held accountable for breaking the rules because not only do they pay twice as much as the tuition as compared to in-state-students but also receive insufficient guidance in terms of academic integrity. 

One possible counter-argument would be that the idea that international students and in this case, particularly Chinese students use certain "Neutralizing Techniques" to justify cheating and plagiarizing is only a fraction of the big picture. The issues maybe more culturally orientated in the way that international students do not feel as being part of the the American culture. They thus tend to believe that it is unnecessary to obey certain American rules because they will ultimately return their home countries. The education system, for example, plays a significant role in determining how people view the concept of academic disintegrity.

Therefore, the "Neutralizing Techniques" may not be as effective in order to explain international students' intentions to cheat and we have to bring the role of "cultural differences" into consideration.  

Research Blog #8--Interview/Primary Source (Survey)

I sent out a short survey to some peers who are also international students (Chinese & Korean) in order to get more ideas in terms of the attitudes that they hold towards academic disintegrity (cheating and plagiarizing).

Here are my questions: What do you think are the possible reasons that international students tend to conduct more unethical academic behavior (cheating and plagiarizing)? How can you justify such act? Do you think it is caused by cultural differences? \

I received four replies so far and most of them conclude that language deficiency is the main reason that causes international students to cheat during exams and that some of them are unwilling to learn any new words or do any extra readings outside classroom. Also, international students, especially students from culture that values collectivism prefer doing activities only with people from the same ethic group. Therefore, their language skills can rarely get improved when they immerge themselves in the limited social group.

Cultual differences also play a significant role in how international students view exams. One person concludes: "International students care about GPA much more than American students. The standard of a horn or student to student who could get scholarship is different between International students and local students. Thus, International students need try harder to get higher grade. Some may choose the easy way, cheating." Chinese students and Korean students are used to compete with each other acadmically due to the education system in their home countries, and when they perceive the fact that they are lack the ability to outperform their American peers, they are more likely to collaborate with each other in order to get good grades.

Another interesting point is that a person says:"They simply don't know how to refuse when others' asking for help (cheating) in exams". This is an interesting point because it seems as if helping each other cheat during exams is a "social norm" in collectivist culture. If one person refuses the request, he/she may be viewed as uncooporative and face the consequences of being marginalized.

The results are similiar to the findings of some scholarly articles that international students use certain excuses, or in this case, neurtralizing techniques to justify their unethical academic behavior (cheating and plagiarizing) by counteracting the guilt. Nevertheless, no one relates the tuition cost/school support to alleged cheating but language problems seem to be the most troubling cause.

Research Blog #7--My Case

 SAT Cheating Case

It was an unusual day for those Chinese students who are going through their college application process in order to enroll in American universities in the upcoming spring semester, 2015. In the last week of October 2014, the College Board sent emails to all students living in China or Korea who had taken the SAT on October 11, informing them that their test scores would be reviewed and delayed for up to a month because of allegations of widespread cheating. It’s the latest in a long line of alleged and cheating scandals in the last few years in China that have involved not only the SATs, but nearly every other widely-administered standardized test, including Advance Placement tests, the ACTs, and English language qualifying exams.

Although the Educational Testing Service (ETS) claims that they have used every possible means to prevent SAT’s exam papers from leaking to the outside world before the tests begin, there appear cases when more people try to challenge the system. According to Ray Nicosia, the director of the Office of ETS, “We stop a lot but there’s always someone trying a new way. The advent of cell phones, tiny cameras and nearly undetectable recording devices, for example, has required his team to up their game”. Earlier in 2007, China Daily reported two students in China used wireless listening devices in their ear canals to cheat on an English exam; they were later hospitalized when the devices got stuck. But, those “technological tactics” are not as common as alleged cheating that involved large amount of Chinese students. In 2011, twenty students were arrested on Long Island, New York, for hiring other students—for a cool $3,600 bucks—to impersonate them in the SAT exam room.

According to one online survey conducted in China, more than 70% of the 160 high school seniors who participated in its survey admitted to cheating on tests. Furthermore, 90% of them claim more of their classmates cheat on tests in colleges. So, why is cheating so commonplace and arguably even acceptable to most Chinese students? The answer is tremendous competition and Chinese people’s admiration of “mian-zi” (the need to save face). Coming from a country with almost 1.36 billion people, one is expected to stand out of the crowd by aceing different kinds of exams, and the social risk of "getting away with it" far exceeds the risk of getting caught. In the case of Chinese students who pursue a degree in American universities, they are even more likely to cheat during exams because they tend to use one of the “Neutralizing Techniques” named “the Need of Responsibility” to justify their cheating behavior. Chinese students are more reluctant to communicate their difficulties, either academically or socially, with counselors and peers due to language difficulties and cultural differences, yet they still feel the responsibility to maintain their “mian-zi” by avoiding showing their weakness. While at the same time since American universities devote minimal resources to understand and help Chinese students adapt into American culture, Chinese students rarely have a smooth cultural transition process and desperately search for ways to retain their “mian-zi”. As a result, the phenomenon of alleged cheating during major exams becomes more prevalent and even acceptable to some people. Thus, if the cultural adaptation issues remain unsolved and that American public higher educational institutions are unable to focus on meeting international students, especially Chinese students’ needs, mass recruiting international students will further fuel China's test-cheating industry.

Research Blog #6: Visual

http://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CAcQjRxqFQoTCKm3mN-AhskCFYl4JgodMQcDGA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fmonitor.icef.com%2F2013%2F09%2Fus-graduate-admissions-up-again-this-year-but-applications-slowing%2F&psig=AFQjCNF4EuQVI--7DUmFY_oEfOHPYuVgAg&ust=1447250054191632

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CAcQjRxqFQoTCPubgfj-hckCFYZDJgod99sHdQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fglobalhighered.wordpress.com%2F2009%2F05%2F13%2Feconomic-benefits-of-international-education-to-the-united-states%2F&psig=AFQjCNH98GBOc_37BahOEHKviTxFjF4fbg&ust=1447249510017973

From the images above, we are able to conclude that international students' application rate and American universities' admission rate have almost the same trend from 2004-2013. There was a huge increase in both application rate and admission rate from 2004-2006, indicating that it was the time when mass recruitment begins. The lower image shows that there is a sharp increase of the amount of economic benefits that international students contribute to the United States starting from the academic year 95-96 and the trend keeps increasing until academic year 07-08; it seems like it will continuously grow. The two statistical results reveal the fact that since the admission rate remains relatively stable over years, international students contribute more dollars to the United States. We therefore may have evidence to conclude that American public higher education intentionally raise the tuition cost for international students in order to compensate for their loss of public funding. And this drastic increase in the amount of international students and the tuition cost will ultimately generate certain adverse consequences.

Lit Review #4--"Not Here Or There"

1. Works Cited

Darcy Holdorf, “NOT HERE OR THERE, Chinese students at Ohio University just try to be themselves”. (2011). Web.

 
2. Main Ideas of the Article:

In this article, Holdorf strives to emphasize the fact that the mass influx of Chinese students inevitably leads to them being separated from the rest of the student groups due to lack of school support, which in this case, Ohio University. According to the article, “From 2004 to 2010, the number of Chinese undergraduates in Ohio University surged from 17 to 603. Today, 81 percent of international students enrolled at the university hail from China. Such high enrollment rate for Chinese students in a sense obliterates the significance for them to study abroad and creates more obstacles during the cultural transtition process. On the one hand, since dorms are filled with Chinese students, the possibility of making friends with their American peers are substantially restricted.Also, Chinese students speak mandarin all the time when they hand out with each other which prevents them from developing language proficiency. “In Scott Quad, a student residence hall nicknamed “Chinatown”, 180 of the 218 residents are Chinese students. Swarms of Chinese students have even made themselves start to complain about too many people of their own race and too little chance to speak English or hang out with Americans”. It is like that Chinese students are forced to be differentiated from their American peers since they seem to have insufficient resources in order to successfully adapt into American culture. The photos above portraits Chinese students’ daily lives in Ohio University that it is as if that they are still in China. Since English is a second language to international students from China, they are required to finish the ESL Program before pursuing their major. After school, Chinese students hang out together at their dorms by cooking noodles and playing mahjong, and we would assume that these activities further prevent them from successfully transiting into a different cultural environment.


3. Quotes:

1. “Most Chinese students come from big cities and have a hard time adapting themselves to life in American small towns. “The previous picture of America in my mind is (composed of) big cities like New York and Los Angeles. But after I arrived in Ohio, I find it is totally different.” After the class is over, Popo, in cheetah print leggings and patent leather pumps, leaves the classroom. She says that she loves to dress differently than others”.

2. “By its very nature, Chinese communities on American campuses are in the gray area between China and the United States. In class is a bunch of English speaking and listening training and U.S. Culture 101. After class, it is the close-knit circle of Chinese friends where no English can be heard. Many Chinese students lose touch with the U.S. campus culture immediately after their arrival”.
 
3. “Vicki Seefeldt West was hired as the Senior Assistant Director for International Recruitment at Ohio University. West helped form relationships with partner agencies in China that advertise, recruit and help students with the application process. Since OU began working with agencies, enrollment of international students from China has increased by 70%. West believes that the agency model is mutually beneficial, easing the application process for students while upping the universities international enrollment. "Some regard these agencies as these evil, unethical entities whereas in a lot of cases they really are providing services for the families," says West. "Yes, you'll find some agencies that are unethical but you'll find that in any business model and that's why we have to be careful and diligent in working with them””.

4. “Juggling language courses and life on their own in a strange nation, most Chinese students naturally huddle together for help even before they start to explore the exotic culture”.


4. Conlcusion:
The aggressive recruitment of Chinese students in Ohio University is not a single case but many public universities in the United States use the same tactic. International students who are not proficient in English writing and speaking are normally required to graduate from ESL Programs first before pursuing their major, which may be a substantial obstacle for them. The situation somewhat predicts alleged cheating because there are many of whom, such as Andy Liu find it extremely difficult to resolve language difficulties and therefore sometimes utilize “shortcuts” in order to get through it. The cheating may even start from the college application process because there are many Chinese students who use agencies that help them embellish their personal statements and sometimes ghostwriting for them. Consequently, both the integrity of the entire admission process and the reputation of Chinese student are at risk.
 
Nevertheless, American public universities seem to devote more effort in the recruiting process as compare to the help that they provide after international students arrive on campus. The fact that Chinese students are restricted to their own ethnic group in Ohio University is not merely due to the fact that the Chinese culture values collectivism, but also because American colleges do not provide sufficient resources for them to reach out to their American peers. Besides the mass amount of tuition that international students paid to American public universities each year, many of them perceive that they are still at their homecountry where students study and hang out with each other who share the same race and ethnicity.

Thus, international students’ college experience can rarely ensure them having a successful cultural adapation process and it is reasonable to assume that that is the primary reason for the increasing amount of alleged cheating cases in various fields. It is therefore worth exploring whether international students’ receive sufficient school support both academically and socially aftering entering American colleges, and whether their subject experience predicts cheating beahavior and to what extent.

Lit Revire #3

1. Works Cited

Dave Tomar. “The Shadow Scholar: How I Made a Living Helping College Kids Cheat” (2012)

2. Main ideas of the book

Dave Tomar is a graduate of Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey. He published an article titled “The Shadow Scholar” in 2010. In the article, Tomar revealed certain ugly truth in terms of the prevalence of college cheating by describing his experience as an “academic ghostwriter”. Then in 2012, Tomar published this book and provided a more detailed elaboration about how he became a ghostwriter as well as how he came clean. Tomar believed that American’s higher education was poorly managed and has become a business rather than aiming for improving academic proficiency. There was one chapter in his book titled “The RU Screw” (22-39) that was relatively representative, where he particularly condemned his college (Rutgers) for having the structure of bureaucracy. Tomar described how a public University like Rutgers runs more like business and strives to ripe students off in stead of providing sufficient support.

3. Quotes from the book

1. “I wish that parking tickets had less of a defining role in my experiences in college. Problem is, Parking and Transportation Services as the most efficiently run department in the entire university. It was as if all of the school’s resources had been dedicated to punishing scofflaw parkers, and the manpower and resources left for meaningful academic assistance, quality control, and psychological counseling had been utterly depleted” (Tomar, 22).


2. “The school couldn’t issue you a schedule without two overlapping classes. It couldn’t approve your financial aid without losing your paperwork. It couldn’t print your transcript without accidentally faxing your medical records to the student listserv. But if your meter had expired twenty seconds ago, you could be damn sure that a parking attendant was already writing your ticket out nineteen seconds ago” (Tomar 22).


3. “Rutgers is also, like most colleges, a business. But colleges are a special kind of business. It’s not simply that some colleges are structured more like corporations than like places of learning. It’s that many colleges are shitty businesses that don’t give a crap about customer service or quality assurance” (Tomar 23).


4. “This is every symptom of a sick system; every consequence of designing an institution of learning to function like a multinational business; every demonstration of the university’s commitment to its corporate sponsors at the expense of its student body; every bit of evidence that the educational goals of the school are secondary tp its vitality as a firm” (Tomar 25).


4. Conclusion:

In this chapter of his book, Tomar revealed some ugly truth about Rutgers University’s bureaucratic system and the problems last even until today. Students are not even treated like customers. They receive limited amount of support and constantly get charged. Tomar described his experience of trying to call the Parking and Transportation Services in order to resolve some parking issues and for five and a half minutes, he merely received two voices telling him to hold. The situation is pretty much the same when many international students try to contact the admission office during their application process.  Although there was a department named “Center for International Students and Global Services”, it is getting difficult to receive help from them since you have to make appointments in advance or go to pre-determined walk-in hours which may be conflict with your class schedule. Nevertheless, international students still get charged twice the tuition cost as compared to in-state students plus many extra fees. However, some students use these difficulties as excuses to justify certain unethical behavior,  such as cheating and plagiarizing. The behavior can be explained by the theory of Techniques of neutralization.  The theory proposes that those who commit illegitimate acts temporarily neutralize certain values within themselves which would normally prohibit them from carrying out such acts, such as morality, obligation to abide by the law, and so on. In simpler terms, it is a psychological method for people to turn off "inner protests" when they do, or are about to do something they themselves perceive as wrong. Consequently, since some students experience the emotion of being owed by the university, they no longer perceive such strong guilt when performing unethical behavior. They tend to justify the act of cheating and plagiarizing as a payback towards schools' lack of support.  The problem will never be resolved if public universities continuously to function like business corporations and aim towards earning monetary gains instead of focusing on promoting support and services for students. The situation is even more detrimental for international students if public education fails to assure a smooth transition process when they encounter different cultural values and language barriers. It is therefore worth exploring the relationship between school support and the cheating/plagiarism culture in American public universities, especially why international students tend to cheat exams more under certain conditions.

Research Blog #5: Bibliography with Five Scholarly Sources

1. Abe, J. Talbot, D.M. Geelhoed, R.J. "Effects of a peer program on international student adjustment. Journal of College Student Development", 39, 539–47 (1998).

2. Chang, H.-B. "Attitudes of Chinese students in the United States. Sociology of Social Research", 58, 66–77 (1973).
3. Rajapaksa, S., & Dundes, L. "It’s a long way home: International student adjustment to living in the United States". Journal of College Student Retention, 4, 15-28 (2002)
4. NAFSA: Association of International Educators. "The economic benefits of international students to the U.S. economy academic year 2011-2012". (2012)
5. Douglass, John Aubrey. “International Berkeley: Enrolling International Students Yesterday and Today, Debates on the Benefits of Multicultural Diversity, and Macro Questions on Access and Equity”. Research & Occasional Paper Series: CSHE.3.14 (March, 2014).
6. Elliott, M. A., C.J. Armitage, & C.J. Baughan. "Drivers’ compliance with speed limits: An application of the theory of planned behavior." Journal of Applied Psychology 88 (2003): 964-972.
7. Fischer, K. “Colleges adapt to new kinds of students from abroad: Younger, sometimes less-experienced students require more academic and social support.” The Chronicle of Higher Education (2011).

8. Fishbein, M., & Ajzen , I. “Belief, attitude, intention, and behavior: An introduction to theory and research.” (1975).
9. Ota, Akiko, "Factors Influencing Social, Cultural, and Academic Transitions of Chinese International ESL Students in U.S. Higher Education." Dissertations and Thesis. Paper 1051. (2013).

10. Reisberg, L. “Why do we want international students?” Inside Higher Ed (July, 2012).

Lit Review #2--MSU International Students Struggle to Fit In (Youtube Video).

1. Works Cited

"MSU international students struggle to fit in"
Video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpLnplJBnxQ&feature=em-share_video_user


2. Summary of the video

One of my high school classmates who is currently a junior at Michigan State University shared this video with me after viewing my blog. The recorders of the video are from a student organization of MSU called the Focal Point and they interviewed several MSU international students in terms of how they define their relationships with their American peers. Most of the people who were interviewed indicated that they found it difficult to build relationships with American students. Their elaboration reflects that there are some severe ramifications of the current trend of aggressively recruiting international students, especially Chinese students.


3. Quotes from students


At the beginning of the video, the recorder points out that "It's no secrets that MSU is home to thousands of international students. In the past year, the international student population grows by 8%, more than 6000 students" and the international program coordinator admits that "It really is around one country and one group and that is Chinese Undergraduates". It is therefore reasonable for us to suspect that some of these Chinese Undergraduates will encounter adaption problems in terms of social skills.


One Chinese students says: "I kinda feel like a long distance between me and them". Here, it is no doubt that "them" refers to his American peers caused by "cultural" and "language" barriers.


However, there is one girl who successfully integrated herself into American culture and she suggests that: "I felt Americans are really really like the top friendly..."


4. Conclusion

I personally believe that it is not easy to build a bridge between the cultural difference gap and there are only very few Chinese students who would have the courage to date an American. Surely we have to be open-minded but I do not see the necessity to become an American. However, international students, especially Chinese students definitely need to jump out of the circle of collectivism and interact with their peers from different countries. This is the only way that can help prevent "racial isolation" by creating positive images. We have to actively adapt into a different culture instead of hiding behind the group and speak Mandarin every single day.

Research Blog #4--Research Proposal (Updated)

Working Title: 

How Do American Public Universities Help Resolve Adaptation Issues for International Students and The Effects On Their Academic Performance For Lacking School Support

Topic

The number of international students, especially Chinese students has increased significantly in American public educational institutions and the trend is predictable with the popularity of globalization. Since the economy conditions of countries in South Asia have developed significantly over the past thirty years, parents from middle-class families in China are more than willing to provide financial support for their children to study at American colleges. As a collective group, international students and their dependents contribute $21,807,000,000 to the U.S. economy annually. A critical point is that since their funding comes mostly from overseas and not from U.S. sources; this economic contribution to the U.S. society is not only from tuition ($15,812,000,000), but also from the living expenses, local services, and products international students and their dependents consume ($14,394,000,000) and has, in fact, helped create more jobs in the U.S.( Zhai, 2004; Association of International Educators [NAFSA], 2012). Therefore, we can conclude that admitting international students as compared to local students is an efficient way to compensate for the recent loss of state funding and taxation. However, the trend tends to create adverse effects in terms of public higher education's accountability in many flagship universities. For example, currently some state universities collaborate with for-profit recruiting agencies in China and lower the admission requirements in order to recruit more international students, simply because the business is lucrative. Liz Reisberg points out in her essay “Why do we want international students?” (July, 2012) that “When universities take the easy route to recruitment and “purchase” international students by paying agents to deliver warm bodies, it’s hard to believe that they will do the hard work necessary to host and support students from diverse cultures responsibly. More likely a senior administrator sees the opportunity of working with agents as an easy way to increase revenue without an additional budget line for infrastructure or personnel” (Reisberg). The idea that more American colleges "purchase" international students abroad implies that privatizing the recruitment process has enormous economic benefits. It’s tempting to believe that when American colleges use shortcuts in recruiting, they are less likely to make the institutional commitment necessary to ensure international students a successful transition process in college. Consequently, since American colleges lack the understanding of certain unique needs of this diverse group and commit the necessary resources for the services that international students require, more international students suffer from cultural adaption issues. For instance, there are inevitable collisions in terms of cultural differences such as individualism to collectivism. Karin Fischer proposes an idea called the “Classroom Culture Clashes” in her article by explaining: “Colleges adapt to new kinds of students from abroad: Younger, sometimes less-experienced students require more academic and social support. One of the places cultural differences come to a head is in the classroom. American educational culture emphasizes critical thinking, drawing conclusions, and classroom participation. Those may be foreign concepts to students schooled in systems that stress rote memorization and esteem for one's teachers. Tonya Veltrop, director of international and off-campus programs at Westminster, says many of her East Asian students turn in papers copied word-for-word from books and other primary sources. "They see that as respectful," she says. "We'd call it cheating."” (Fisher, May 2011). Therefore, we see that there generates severe consequences if international students are not provided with sufficient support during the adaptation process. Cultural differences and traditions add more difficulties for international students to define the boundary of certain behavior such as cheating and plagiarizing, which in turn creates more obstacles academically in addition to language difficulties. There are numerous cases where there are certain number of Chinese students who are expelled from their colleges due to plagiarizing whereas most are even unaware of the definition and consequences of the behavior. Therefore, it is reasonable to speculate how much support American colleges provide for international students that could help them overcome adaptation issues in addition to aggressive recruitment. I propose to consider how much support that American public education provides for international students in terms of their cultural adaptation process and more specifically, whether the result can help explain the growing trend of cheating and plagiarism among Chinese students . Research suggests that pairing counselors/mentors with international students may help them adjust better to American colleges and it is also crucial to provide English courses in order to help them succeed academically.

Research Question:

To what extent do American public universities provide support for international students during their cultural adaptation process? Also, do international students, especially Chinese students are being adversely influenced academically so that more of them conduct unethical behavior such as cheating and plagiarizing due to lack of school support?

Theory:

There are substantial research papers that explore the effects of the current trend of the growing amount of international students in American public universities as well as the associated adaptation and acculturation issues that seem inevitable to them. Nowadays, American public universities advocate for the idea of diversity and open their doors for international students to prove its significance. However, the motive behind this movement is worth exploring due to the fact that admitting international students substantially help compensate the loss of state funding. John Aubrey Douglass, the author of the research essay: “INTERNATIONAL BERKELEY: Enrolling International Students Yesterday and Today, Debates on the Benefits of Multicultural Diversity, and Macro Questions on Access and Equity*” specifically analyzes the situation in California. He proposes the theory of a “Zero Sum Conundrum” by arguing that the UC education system forces low-income Californian families to compete the opportunity of going to college with international students due to lack of funding; there will hardly have a balance between two parties and international students tend to win because they have more financial leverages. While Douglass condemns the fact that the UC education system covers its true motives for heavily recruiting international students by saying that it is a way to promote diversity in American colleges, he views international students as a collective group. Nevertheless, as individuals, adapting to Western culture is inevitably a major challenge for international students, especially Chinese students. Undergraduate and master’s degree students at U.S. colleges report various cultural and social issues. These include differences with the norms and social practices of American society (Jackson, Ray, & Bybell, 2013; McLachlan & Justice, 2009; Sherry, Thomas & Chui, 2010); identity complications due to race and ethnicity (Kim, 2012); and disruptions of family relationships due to academic demands and distance from home (Poyrazli & Kavanaugh, 2006; Zhang, Smith, Swisher, Fu, & Forgarty, 2011). These issues are common to both domestic and international students who travel away from home to different college locations. However, there are certain significant challenges that directly affect the international student population, particularly, the lack of English language proficiency and adjustments to differences in teaching approaches (Kim, 2011; Kuo, 2011; Sherry, Thomas, & Chui, 2010; Telbis, Helgeson, & Kingsbury, 2014). Within the American academic culture, students contribute to each other’s learning experiences through group discussions and projects. This level of interaction among students is difficult during the early stages of the international students’ tenure as they are of diverse educational backgrounds with different teaching methods and student values (Kim, 2011; Young, 2011). Furthermore, those who speak English as a second language have difficulties interrelating with peers and instructors, and feel challenged by the expectations of academic writing and oral presentations (Kim, 2012; Sue & Rawlings, 2013). Similar troubles were evident outside of classroom settings as foreign students try to integrate with the American community (Chavajay, 2013).

Since the U.S. individualistic cultural values and collectivist cultural values are significantly different, this leads to international students encounter significant challenges in acclimating and adjusting to new academic and social lives once they arrive on campus (Lee & Rice, 2007; Trice, 2007)” (Ota 3). The idea of collectivism is almost exclusive to Chinese students and that somewhat predicts the fact that Chinese students find it difficult to fit into American society; not to mention that language difficulties create more barriers academically. Consequently, the feeling of being isolated and marginalized serve as a "Neutralizing Technique" that directly contributes to the prevalence of certain unethical behavior such as cheating and plagiarism. The idea of "Neutralization Technique" is proposed in Gresham Sykes and David Matza's theory of Neutralization. They argue that would-be teenager delinquents must find ways to preemptively neutralize the guilt and protect their self-image if they choose to participate in delinquent or deviant behavior. One way to do this is by using techniques of neutralization that provide episodic relief from moral constraint and allow individuals to drift back and forth between delinquent and conventional behavior. Drift is possible because neutralization techniques blunt the moral force of dominant cultural norms and neutralize the guilt of delinquent behavior in specific situations. Sykes and Matza outlined five neutralization techniques: denial of responsibility, denial of injury, denial of victims, appeal to higher loyalties, and condemnation of condemners. In the case of international students' intention to cheat and plagiarize, the technique of "denial of responsibility" and "appeal to higher loyalties" may play a significant role in causing the problems,

In order to further explore the ramifications of cheating as a result of unsuccessful adaptation and acculturation process, we can adopt the theoretical model of TPB (Theory of Planned Behavior). According to the TPB, behavioral intentions and perceived behavioral control are the main determinants of behavior. Intentions are determined independently by attitudes toward the behavior, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control (Ajzen, 1985; Elliott et al., 2003). Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that in addition to cultural differences that made it difficult for international students to adapt smoothly to American colleges, they also form certain negative attitudes and subjective norms due to the lack of staff support and even negligence. Thus this theoretical framework of TPB provides us with more possibility of understanding the rationale behind Chinese students’ alleged cheating behavior since the issue is not merely an unethical behavior but an inevitable ramification of a failed cultural adaptation process.






Bibliography

Chavajay, P. "Perceived social support among international students at a U.S. university. Psychological Reports: Sociocultural Issues in Psychology", 112(2), 667 – 677. (2013). Print.

Douglass, John Aubrey. “International Berkeley: Enrolling International Students Yesterday and Today, Debates on the Benefits of Multicultural Diversity, and Macro Questions on Access and Equity”. Research & Occasional Paper Series: CSHE.3.14. March, 2014. Web.

Elliott, M. A., C.J. Armitage, & C.J. Baughan. "Drivers’ compliance with speed limits: An application of the theory of planned behavior." Journal of Applied Psychology 88 (2003): 964-972. Web.

Fischer, K. “Colleges adapt to new kinds of students from abroad: Younger, sometimes less-experienced students require more academic and social support.” The Chronicle of Higher Education (2011). Web.

Fishbein, M., & Ajzen , I. “Belief, attitude, intention, and behavior: An introduction to theory and research.” (1975). Web.

Jackson, M., Ray, S., & Bybell, D. "International Students in the U.S.: Social and psychological adjustment. Journal of International Students", 3(1), 17-28. (2013). Print.

Kim, H. Y. "International graduate students' difficulties: Graduate classes as a community of practices. Teaching in Higher Education", 16(3), 281-292. (2011). Print.

McLachlan, D. A., & Justice, J. "A grounded theory of international student well-being. Journal of Theory Construction & Testing", 13(1), 27-32. (2009). Print.

Ota, Akiko, "Factors Influencing Social, Cultural, and Academic Transitions of Chinese International ESL Students in U.S. Higher Education." Dissertations and Thesis. Paper 1051. (2013). Web.

Poyrazli, S., & Kavanaugh, P. R. "Marital status, ethnicity, academic achievement, and adjustment strains. College Student Journal", 40(4), 767-780. (2006). Print.

Reisberg, L. “Why do we want international students?” Inside Higher Ed. July, 2012. Web.

Sherry, M., Thomas, P., & Wing-Hong, C. "International students: A vulnerable student population. Higher Education", 60(1), 33-46. (2010). Print.

Sue, E., & Rawlings, M. "Preparedness of Chinese students for American culture and communicating in English. Journal of International Students", 3(1), 330-341. (2013). Print.

Telbis, N. M., Helgeson, L., & Kingsbury, C., "International students' confidence and academic success. Journal of International Students", 1(2), 43- 49. (2013). Print.

Young, A. "First time international college students’ level of anxiety in relationship to awareness of their learning-style preferences. J. of International Students", 1(2), 43-49. (2011). Print.

Zhang, J., Smith, S., Swisher, M., Fu, D., & Forgarty, K., "Gender role disruption and marital satisfaction among wives of Chinese international students in the United States. Journal of Comparative Family Studies", 42(3), 523-542. (2011). Print.

Research Blog #3: How Privatization Connects to My Topic

Privatization connects to my topic because the trend of enrolling more and more international students contributes substantially to the increase of college tuition in the US. This idea is discussed in many ways in the readings such as “Understanding privatization.” In this reading "The Chinese Mother;s American Dream", the author Karin Fischer argues "American colleges offer relatively little financial assistance to international undergraduates, which is where the real growth from China has been. Indeed, though many institutions are loath to admit it, overseas recruitment has been a budgetary bright spot during and after the recession. Chinese students’ ability to pay is part of their appeal" (Fischer 7). The observation reflects that there is a cause-and-effect relationship between China's booming economy and the growing admission rates of Chinese students into American colleges. International students are willing to contribute twice the tuition in order to have the opportunity to be educated in American colleges since Chinese parents believe that the Return on Investment is incalculable if their children can earn a bachelors degree in the US. Therefore, the trend tends to drive up the overall cost of attending colleges especially when state funding drops simultaneously. Not only do the cost of textbooks increases, but universities also privatize services (hiring part-time professors, outsourcing accounting and dining services, etc.), which add more miscellaneous fees to tuition. Consequently, both American students and international students undertake more financial pressure and concern more about graduation. The worries of being exploited the education privileges thus adversely affect their academic performance as well as psychological health. I would like to gather more information of how the growing tuition cost affect students' as individuals because I believe that students from affluent families must experience differently from those who take students loans to attend colleges. I would assume that admitting international students implicitly reinforces the prevalence of privatizing American's public higher education and will continuously explore the issue on a more sophisticated level.

Lit Review #1

                                       
1. Works Cited

Stephens, Paul. "International Students: Separate But Profitable." Washington Monthly 45.9/10 (2013): 55. Points of View Reference Center. Web. 9 Oct. 2015.


2. Main ideas of the article

This article proposes some concerns over the issue that the amount of international students recruited by U.S. flagship state universities is increasing drastically over the past five years. The author Stephens Paul provided specific examples of Purdue University that depends heavily on international students to compensate for the declining state spending on public higher education. Paul points out several downsides of the rising of international students' role in American Higher Education. Since flagship state universities such as Purdue does not require SAT/ACT scores for international students' admission, they alleviate the risk of driving down school's selectivity Therefore, this relatively lower admission requirement fosters big business do college recruiting (for-profit agencies, for example) and the integrity of the process can no longer be assured. The large amount of international students in state universities also leads to isolation because international students are grouped together and thus rarely reach out to their American peers. From an economic standpoint, admitting more international student implies that state disinvestment will continue and there will be even less state support for American public higher education.

3. Quotes from the article

1) "International students bring a lot of money into the United States, contributing roughly $22 billion to the U.S. economy. in 2012, according to one estimate. Francisco Sanchez, the undersecretary for international trade at the Commerce Department, has said the U.S. has “no better export” than higher education, and Larry Summers, former secretary of the treasury and former Harvard president, lists “exporting higher education”—bringing more international students to American institutions—as a key part of his recommendations for economic growth" (56).

2) "In Indiana, international students bring $688 million in economic benefits, equivalent to 40 percent of what the state spends on higher education every year. At Purdue, the tuition paid by international undergraduates since 2007 accounts for almost half of all the new revenue it has raised through tuition" (56).

3) "Chinese parents who have spent years saving nest eggs to send their child to university see highly ranked American public schools as a great value compared to private colleges. With growing wealth and a lack of educational infrastructure in China—and millions of single children reaching college age—Chinese parents are willing to pay the price" (56).

4) "The search for out-of-state tuition dollars has been going on for a long time, but it was somewhat kept in check by a limited pool of students, and the possible loss of prestige from lowering standards. But a limitless supply of international students changes the game quite a bit, Roza said. “People say, ‘Oh well, they’re supporting our kids,”’ she said, referring to the financial benefits of having out-of-state and international students. “But they aren’t supporting our kids if our kids aren’t getting in” " (57)

5) “It’s a classic scenario of a developing market,” said David Hawkins, director of public policy and research for the National Association for College Admission Counseling, about the use of agencies for recruiting student abroad. “The borders are not well determined.” Hawkins’s organization recent released a report recommending best practices for recruiting abroad, a scene that he has characterized as a “gold rush.” The recommendations call for strict guidelines to ensure transparency and institutional accountability in the use of paid agents. But even for universities that don’t pay agents to recruit abroad, gray areas remain in the relationship, Hawkins said, since the university is largely dependent on their services for international applications" (58).

6) "It raises the specter of a downward spiral of state disinvestment and decreasing public support for universities, adding grease to the slippery slope of increasing privatization" (59).

4. Conclusion

I think this article could greatly contribute to my topic as it supports my proposed ideas. It is also useful in the way that it provides specific examples/evidence in terms of the point that I am trying to make. Admitting international students benefit flagship state universities more financial as compared to academically. The idea of promoting diversity merely supplements the big picture but not the emphasis. For international students, although having the opportunity to pursue a degree in American universities is inevitably an advantage, most of them are isolated and only communicate with people with the same nationality. Hence, this isolation may have adverse effects on how international students place themselves in American universities as well as how they perceive the school environment. I would want to gather more information about international students' subject experience in American colleges and hopefully the searching process gives me a better frame for that purpose.

Research Blog #2--develop more ideas about my research topic.

Today's class was extremely beneficial in terms of teaching us to do research on scholarly articles and journals that can help develop our research topics. I was able to generate more ideas about my topic based on the articles that I found on ERIC: "Where We Are Now--The Presence and Importance of International Students to Universities in the United States", "Tuition Fees for International Students in Finland: Where to Go from Here?", "International Students as a Resource for Achieving Comprehensive Internationalization" and "The Interplay of International Students' Acculturative Stress, Social Support, and Acculturation Modes". I located two main sub-topics for my research topic . On the one hand, I would like to explore more details about how the growing admission rate of international students affect the cost of attending public higher educational institutions. Also, I would like to explore issues about acculturation. There exists substantial differences between Western culture and Asian culture whereas universities have always been viewed as a place where diversification is valued. I would like to conduct interviews with some international students from China, Japan and Korea and ask them if they had a smooth cultural transition upon entering Rutgers and/or if they had experienced instances involve racial discrimination. I assume that the acculturation process may cause stress both psychologically and physically, which in turn adversely affect international students' academic performance. More importantly, I was able to detect some controversies over my topic because although it seems unequal to charge twice the tuition for international students, admitting more foreign student tends to be an inevitable and necessary step for American colleges, due to the decreasing amount of state fund and tax. From international students' standpoint, the fact of having the opportunity to attend American universities is extremely beneficial for their future development. Therefore, the deal seems to be a win-win situation for both parties. I believe that the bargain is worth exploring in addition to the problems associated with the rise in tuition cost.

Research Blog #1--Introduction to my Research Topic.

The topic of “College” caught my eyes right away when I was trying to register for a writing course during the Spring semester. The reason is blunt and simple: it reminds me of my own experience as one of the many international students chasing “American Dreams” at Rutgers. In case you have not yet noticed the change in the geography of students in the U.S. higher education, just think about how many times in a day that you encounter people with faces other than White when wandering around Rutgers’ campuses. According to Neil G. Ruiz, the number of foreign students on F-1 visas in U.S. colleges and universities grew dramatically from 110,000 in 2001 to 524,000 in 2012. The sharpest increases occurred among students from emerging economies such as China and Saudi Arabia. [1] About two thirds of these international students pursue a bachelor’s or higher degrees are in science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM) or business, which directly leads to a disproportionately distributed major selection mechanism. The effect of this rapid growth of international students is profound and substantial: during the year of 2014. International students contributed over $27 billion to the US economy resulted in an increase of $3 billion from the prior year. [2] The fact that there is a booming trend of admitting international student into the U.S. higher educational institutions is not only beneficial to the U.S. government financially, but also helps promote the idea of “cosmopolitanism. Nevertheless, admitting more international students to American's higher educational institutions also brings negative effects. On the one hand, international students compete fiercely with American students academically and that further reinforces college stress; on the other hand, since most international students are from upper-middle class, they do not need to worry about paying off student loans because their parents are more than willing to pay for their education. Consequently, it is obvious that international students play a crucial role in driving up college tuition. I personally as an international student have great interests in exploring how international students define themselves in the U.S. higher education system. I would like to interview international students from different countries in terms of their college experiences in the U.S. as well as how the experiences change them and in what ways.

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[1] Neil G. Ruiz, “Immigration Facts on Foreign Students,” Washington: Brookings Institution, 2013. Available atwww.brookings.edu/metro/foreignstudents; Institute of International Education, Open Doors: Report on International Educational Exchange, New York: Institute of International Education, 2013.

[2] Open Doors Report, the Institute of International Education and the State Department, 2014.