Before we get in to the specifics of academic enablement, let’s discuss enablement in general terms. Enablement frequently comes up on issues of addiction or wrongdoing. Let’s take the example of the alcoholic and his enabler. The alcoholic frequently runs into difficulties as a result of the alcoholic addiction, such as missing work, missing school, engaging in abusive behavior, having blackouts, running into money troubles, and not meeting responsibilities at home or work. What the enabler does, in the process of trying to help the alcoholic, is to actually encourage the behavior. Examples of enablement of the alcoholic include calling in to work for him, coming up with money, or after getting beaten up by the alcoholic, making excuses for him or blaming the abused for the abusive behavior. The enabler never makes the alcoholic own up and take responsibility for his actions and their consequences. So this is how enablement works.
Academic enablement is just a specific type of enablement dealing with encouraging bad academic habits. Let’s take an example to illustrate. Let’s say that we have a student named Bob in middle school who has a mom named Marie and a history teacher named Sally. Sally assigns Bob a term paper due near the end of the semester. Sally encourages students to get started early because of the size of the project, and encourages students to submit drafts along the way to receive feedback and guidance. Most students do exactly that. However, Bob procrastinates and doesn’t get started until the night before the term paper is due. He tries to stay up all night to get it done, but falls asleep at his desk at 4 AM and does not finish his paper. In the morning, Marie comes in to Bob’s room to wake him up to get ready for school. Bob tells his mom that he needs to call in sick since he didn’t finish his term paper.
Upon hearing the news about the term paper, Marie agrees with that Bob that he should call in sick, and actually makes the call for him, claiming that Bob has the flu. In addition, Bob knows that his mom was a history major in college and is good at writing papers and asks if she will help him write the paper. Marie agrees and writes an outline for Bob and starts researching the topic on the internet. She ends up writing over half the paper, plus the bibliography page, does all the internal citations, and does all the final editing. The whole process ends up taking two more days, and Marie ends up calling in sick again on Bob’s behalf for both extra days. Bob ends up with an A on the project.
What take-home message did Bob get from his mom? That it is okay to procrastinate, okay to have other people cover for you, okay not to take responsibility for one’s actions, okay to let other people do work for you that is actually your job. Because Bob got this take-home message, he thinks that this is acceptable and will work for the future. Sally was just “trying to help,” but now Bob thinks that there are no consequences for procrastination. By Marie writing the outline, writing the bibliography, and doing the citations, and doing all the final editing, Bob will not have learned how to outline a paper, do internal citations, write a bibliography, or edit a paper. In addition, by Marie writing over half the paper, Bob will not have understood how to conceptualize and write an entire paper, as opposed to just a part of one. Also, covering for Bob means that Bob didn’t get the concept of time management, calendar management and appropriate project planning.
Fast forward a few years. Now Bob is in college, where, unlike grammar school, grades have a significant impact on life options. Bob has a term paper in history due at the end of the semester. He puts it off until the end of the semester, and doesn’t get started until the night before the due date… There are a lot of ways this story can come out, but none of them are good. Let’s look at some scenarios.
Bob decides to “borrow” quite a bit from an article he found online that seems relevant. He uses the “copy and paste” method, and because he does not know how to do internal citations, he does not put the text in quotes or give credit to the author. He turns the paper in on time, figuring it is good for at least a B. Unfortunately, as his professor Dr. Jones is reading Bob’s paper, he becomes suspicious because it is “too good” for a student to have written. He takes some of the text and runs a quick google search on it. Bingo. The article which Bob used is the first one that comes up in Professor Jones’ search. Professor Jones reviews his plagiarism policy as stated in his syllabus. The policy clearly gives him the right to give the student an F for the semester. Professor Jones does not award Bob a grade for the project, but just writes, in clear, bold, underlined red letters, “See me.” Ouch. Bob’s options are to accept the F for the semester or appeal the grade and risk having a conviction of academic dishonesty on his transcripts. Forever. Bob decides to take the F and repeat the course. Ouch.
OK, that’s not the only possible outcome for Bob, but it is one of the worst. Let’s take a different scenario. Instead of Bob “borrowing” from an internet source using the copy and paste procedure and not quoting or citing, instead Bob looks at A+ Term Papers or some such website and finds a paper that seems kind of related to his topic. He purchases it for $50, and expects to get an A on his project. However, when Professor Jones starts grading Bob’s paper, he notices that it seems off-topic. Also, the format for the citations is wrong. Professor Jones gets suspicious, and runs a Google search on some of the text of paper. The first hit is from A+ term papers. The website offers only a fragment of the paper for free, but it’s an exact match. From there, things do not go well for Bob.
Briefly, let’s review some other outcomes for Bob. He throws something together at the last minute and gets a D- on the paper, bringing his average for the semester to a C. Or Bob asks Marie for help, and she tells him that she is too busy with the kids, and because Bob doesn’t know how to write a research paper, he gets a flat C, which is then dropped a letter grade for lateness, ending up with a D on the paper and a C- in the course.
All these bad outcomes come as a direct consequence for Marie not making Bob accept the consequences for procrastination on a paper in middle school. All Marie had to do is say no to Bob’s request to call in sick for him and help him write his paper at the last minute. She should have sent Bob off to school without his paper being done, and allow Bob to take the consequences in middle school. That way, Bob would learn from his mistakes and not repeat them. Moral of the story? Don’t be an academic enabler.