Helping - "Down on the Island" by Jim Cooper

The eighth chapter of Jim Cooper’s “Down by the Island”, which is titled “Helping”, narrates the author’s experience with Puerto Rican students cheating on their English tests, but claiming they were basically “helping” each other. The author claims how Puerto Ricans are the friendliest and most hospitable people in the world, which can clearly be seen in how students help their classmates get good grades. This was completely surprising for Cooper, mainly because in the United States, college students were taught to be competitive and ambitious toward others, whereas in Puerto Rico, students took a different and more compassionate approach.

In this chapter, Cooper narrates how Puerto Rican students did not realize the severity and consequences of their actions; what these students called “helping”, was actually cheating. In fact, when Cooper asked students why they were looking at their classmates’ papers, students would genuinely say it was because they were really desperate for the answer in order to get a good grade. However, Cooper also criticizes how teachers and professors promote this kind of behavior in their students.  Tests were specifically made to evaluate students regardless if they dominated the material or not, which actually promoted students to do anything just to receive a good grade.

To prevent “helping”, as Cooper portrays in this chapter, students should be judged on other activities that promote independent thinking, such as group projects, open debates and discussions, and oral presentations. Although tests are important because they measure the student’s capacity of understanding the material, teachers should also implement these other measures and techniques; testing should not be the only system to decide whether students fail or pass a specific course. By valuing independent thinking, rather than testing and grades, students wouldn’t need to cheat or “help” in their college courses.