More on Honor...or Lack Thereof

As I said in an earlier post, yesterday I presented my practicum project. Half of the class presented theirs in December and the other half presented yesterday. At each of these sessions, members of the faculty selected the top 5 practicums, for a grand total of 10. Today they announced the final top 5 winners. To the surprise of pretty much the entire graduating class, a student who isn't even graduating with us due to an honor code violation received one of the top five. To me, this is an insult. He's an individual who has lied and cheated and been caught at it at least twice. My point - if you lie and cheat your way through pharmacy school, you will lie and cheat your way through the profession. It's people with his ethics and morals that have caused pharmacists to no longer be the most trusted profession. My anger is less with him than it is with the university. They won't let me wear my Rho Chi honor cords at graduation because "wearing the hood is honor enough." Well, I beg to differ. Standing on the stage with people like him is NOT an honor. It's embarassing. He won't even be receiving a diploma on Saturday because he failed a clinical rotation due to his lying. They're letting him walk in the ceremony and recognizing him at our doctoral hooding for his accomplishment. And what an accomplishment it is - lying and cheating his way to a PharmD.