| Summary: | ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN ONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CONCORDIAN CAMPUS NEWS NOVEMBER 14, 20084 the Fed pickled herring and gjetost brown cheese as a toddler, Eric Dregni grew up in Norway’s col-ony in America: Minnesota. As the recipient of a 2004 Fulbright Fellowship in Creative Writing, Dregni lived in Trondheim, Norway, and wrote about his year in his latest book, “In Cod We Trust: Living the Norwegian Dream.” Concordia Scan Studies Professor, Lisa Sethre-Hofstad, got to know Dregni while she was on sabbatical in Norway and invited him to campus to share his experiences as an immigrant in his grandfather’s homeland. Dregni will visit the Concordia College cam-pus on Nov. 20 and 21. He will entertain students on Thursday evening at 7:30 p.m. on the Library Mezzanine. Friday morning’s presentation to the entire campus community at 9:30 a.m.(also on the Library Mezzanine) will be followed by time for book signing. The Bookstore will have copies of Dregni’s book available for purchase in the library that morning. Eric Dregni’s great-grandfather Ellef fl ed Nor-way in 1893 when it was the poorest country in Europe. More than one hundred years later, his great-grandson traveled back to fi nd that—mostly due to oil and natural gas discoveries—it is now the richest. The circumstances of his return were serendipitous, as the notice that Dregni won a Fulbright Fellowship to go there arrived the same week as the knowledge that his wife Katy was pregnant. Braving a birth abroad and benefi ting from a remarkably generous health care system, the Dregnis’ family came full circle when their son Eilif was born in Norway. In this cross-cultural memoir, Dregni tells the hair-raising, hilarious, and sometimes poignant stories of his family’s yearlong Norwegian experi-ment. Among the exploits he details are staying warm in a remote grass-roofed hytte (hut), surviv-ing a dinner of rakfi sk (fermented fi sh) thanks to 80-proof aquavit, and identifying his great-grand-father’s house in the Lusterfjord only to fi nd out it had been crushed by a boulder and then swept away by a river. To subsist on a student stipend, he rides the meat bus to Sweden for cheap salami with a busload of knitting pensioners. A week later, he and his wife travel to the Lofoten Islands and gnaw on klippefi sk (dried cod) while cats fol-low them through the streets. Dregni’s Scandinavian roots do little to pre-pare him and his family for the year in Trondheim eating herring cakes, obeying the conformist Jan-teloven (Jante’s law), and enduring the mørketid (dark time). “In Cod We Trust” is one Minnesota family’s spirited excursion into Scandinavian life. The land of the midnight sun is far stranger than they previously thought, and their encounters show that there is much we can learn from its unique and surprising culture. Eric Dregni teaches creative writing at the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, Minnesota, and Italian at Hamline University and at the Uni-versity of Minnesota and serves as the Dean for Concordia’s Italian Language Village. He is the author of several books, including “Minnesota Marvels” (Minnesota, 2001) and “Midwest Mar-vels” (Minnesota, 2006). Concordia to host Norwegian American author Eric Dregni CARL B. YLVISAKER LIBRARY News Release Coff ee with Cobbers on Nov. 7 was another well-attended alter-native to sleeping or catching up on homework during community time. The topic of discussion was Ethical Implications on Student Learning and many passionate opinions were shared by students, professors, and administrators alike. The biggest topic of discussion regarded cheating on exams. Senior Jordan Sing expressed the idea that it is up to each indi-vidual student to make an ethical decision. “If you take a test early, your buddies might want to know what is on the test,” he said. “We have a responsibility to know that that is cheating, and that is wrong.” One alternative was off ered by Dr. Gregg Muilenburg of the philosophy department. He said that philosophy paper topics and test questions are not generic, so students can’t simply Google the answer. “There’s no way to cheat [on philosophy papers],” he said. “Each topic is tailored to the course that it is for.” Sing responded to that by saying that students do notice when professors take the time to tailor their assignments. “If a faculty member makes that eff ort, the student wants to put work into the assignment [as a respect to the professor],” Sing said. There are a few steps that Concordia has already taken to put the idea of ethical decisions into students’ minds. The Academic Integrity Statement is the statement that some professors require students to state and sign for tests and papers that say that the work adheres to college policy. The second step that Concordia has taken is the pending im-plementation of the Responsibility and Ethics statement that was written by students and intended for students. This statement was fi rst published for students’ critique this year and has since been subtly altered to better represent an ethics policy from a student perspective. Sophomore Kyle Meerkins said that he thought the Responsi-bility and Ethics statement was a good idea but he feared students wouldn’t make it personal if the only time it was seen was right before a test. “It needs to come out before the test,” he said. “When I am about to take a test, I am focused on remembering all the informa-tion, not the sentence that I am signing. If we start the engage-ment earlier… it will be more eff ective.” Dr. Mark Krejci, dean of the college and vice-president for Aca-demic Aff airs, ended the discussion by saying that cheating and plagiarism ultimately only aff ect the student. “If you start cutting corners now, you might get away with it,” he said. “But somewhere in your life, it will catch up with you.” Overall, the people who attended Coff ee with Cobbers were very passionate about the topic of discussion. Once again, many conversations continued after the event had fi nished, and people were encouraged to bring this topic into their classes or submit Opinions pieces to The Concordian. The next Coff ee with Cobbers is tentatively scheduled for Janu-ary 23. The topic of discussion is yet to be determined, but the Academic Aff airs commissioners are always open to suggestions. BY EMILY MEYER Co-Editor-in-Chief ‘Ethical Implications on Student Learning’ PHOTO BY HANNA STEVENS Prepared and paid for by the Lanning for State Representative Committee, 4307 S. River Haven Rd., Moorhead MN 56560 I wish to extend a sincere THANK YOU to the voters of District 9A! You can expect me to continue working hard for the best interests of our district and region.
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