Intent

If one does not have the intent to do wrong, is one still wrong? I suppose in the criminal world, a charge would be dropped to negligence... which still has a "price tag" attached to it. Our price tag was 10%.

For the first time in my entire academic life, my team and I were told we had stolen work... really Microsoft Word just dropped the footnotes and we missed one, but we did not have the intent to cheat. There was potential for us to lose the entire mark - which would have resulted in my second practicum failure. But since the professor knew the intent wasn't there, he gave us a chance, and as a result our 86% paper was dropped to a 76%.

In my mind, it was a clear, sloppy oversight. We should have caught it upon the final read-over... but we didn't. At least our teacher understood that. And, at least, I know that paper was an 86 paper.

Intent is a weird thing. Each day we have the intent to eat, to sleep, to accomplish certain tasks. Each year, many of us start off with the intent to "quit smoking, lose weight" or any of the other numerous resolutions we make with good intentions. And then there are the actions that occur without intent, breaking someones heart, getting into a random car accident, hurting someones feelings.... there are many things that we don't have the intention for in life that we get off scott free from... I still want my 86%, but since this offense was clearly negligent, I'll take my 76% and raise you a degree.

I hope all is well in your world... I'm a ramblin woman (rose) today.