Plagiarism

Lauren McCabe writes:

As I sat at the airport last weekend, grading my students’ summer reading essays and waiting to take off, I was angry. Not because of the tardiness of my flight, but because I was looking at 15 plagiarized essays from my seniors, seniors who knew better. They had all summer to read a book and write this five-paragraph essay on any topic they wanted. After I read over two essays and saw the exact same words, sentences and paragraphs, it wasn't hard to figure out that these papers had been copied.

After talking with some of my colleagues over the weekend, I learned that plagiarism wasn’t a new concept at my school, Environmental Charter High School, and that most of the students on my list had turned in plagiarized work in the past. I began to wonder why students plagiarize. Could it really be that they were just too lazy to write their own papers? And the essay they turned in and tried to pass as their own was of very low quality. Didn’t they have respect for themselves and their abilities?

While I was venting my frustration to an administrator at my school, he offered a bit of insight into the community I teach in and he grew up in. He explained that the major battle these students are fighting every day does not necessarily come from an external source, but from within. The inferiority complex is a constant war within our students. They “dumbed down” their essays to a level so far below their actual writing abilities because they thought it would be more believable to me that way. They ran away from this challenge because they didn’t believe they could achieve on their own.

This is not to say “poor babies” or to give excuses for blatant plagiarism, but I think it is important to understand the mindsets with which our students walk into the classroom every day and ways by which we can expand those views. Pure laziness is only one possibility of many for explaining why students plagiarize, as is the inferiority complex. But until we consider all of the possibilities and stop labeling students, we will never solve the issue. Malleable intelligence, the concept of intelligence not being fixed, will be the first topic of discussion that I start off with in my next class.

Comments

[evelyn]

Lauren, I understand why you may want to analyze why your students plagiarize, but resist the temptation to do this and just give them a 0. Put as much effort into the grading as they put into the paper.
This is simply immaturity, laziness and seeing if they could get away with it....
Here is what I do...I don't make a big deal about it. I just put a 0 on their papers and write, " Same as Julie's paper; 0 same as David's paper" I don't moralize, I don't lecture, I don't call their parents. It takes me 10 seconds to write it on the paper. I usually never have a plagiarism issue again.
I'm sure you gave your students the option to contact you should they run into difficulty and provided an email or phone number, so there really are no excuses for the plagiarism.

Again, in high school ,students must pass a class to move on to the next grade level , not like in middle school, which is another reason they are turning in poor quality work.

One practical thing you can do and you may already be doing this for students who have trouble structuring an essay is to write out five to seven sample topic sentences for each essay: The background sentence, thesis sentence and 3 to 5 supporting topic sentences and a concluding sentences and have them "build" the essay. This way they have a template to begn using. Santa Monica High School has a website with a paper called the "Sweet Sixteens of Good Writing" It is a helpful handout with sixteen boxes that offer tips on good writing.

Another hint, don't leave the topic wide open but give them five or six options. They still have choice but also have something concrete about which to write. Did you connect the essay to the book they were reading? This way they have to read the book to write about it in the essay.

Great job giving a summer assigment as you are way ahead of the game in knowing a little about each student and their work ethic. It also gives you information that allows you to adjust and correct what you want in your upcoming reading and essay assignments which puts you way ahead of the game. Keep it up!

[Anonymous]

EVERYONE DOES IT!! GET OVER IT ALREADY!!

[David]

15 seniors plagarized an essay? The same one?

This is not your fault. It is a break down in the system. This is learned behavior that has most likely happened in the past without consequence.

In any serious academic institution, plagarism is a serious offense. I hear you saying that the administrator, in sentiment, excused the behavior. Why didn't the administrator offer to come to your class and deal with this problem so you can focus your mind and energy on curricular and instructional issues?

I don't want to be too cynical, but I can guess at the answer. First, the system emphsizes attendance and seat time. Any serious discpline must have the possibility of suspension as its ultimate consequence. Administrators hate suspensions because it takes away from attendance and makes the school's discipline statistics look bad.

I like the advice of evelyn. Don't moralize on the issue, but absolutely don't accept plagarism. The students will figure it out for themselves. You can focus on being the best english teacher you can be, and model profesionalism to the students. Too many teachers stray the academic path in an attempt to be life coaches.

[Am y P]

It isn't just underprivileged high school students. Plagiarism is a plague at all levels, including very ritzy universities populated by kids from upper-middle class homes. So, don't buy the excuses, get yourself a subscription to turnitin.com, and remember that by being tough now, you can save a plagiarist a lot of pain in the future if they manage to get into college. Unless there are serious consequences now, they will keep on doing it, each time they're caught telling the teacher that they didn't know.

The pattern of plagiarism that I've heard about is that in this internet age, the kids often have really bad process for their writing. So, you'll see a lone plagiarized sentence in a single paragraph, or you'll find that the student's work is a strange hybrid of original and plagiarized work, even when hunting down the material to plagiarize and weaving it into a coherent text must actually have been more work. They need extremely explicit instruction in how to write and how to include citations. You might want to explain to them that using citations impresses the teacher, because it demonstrates that you've done a lot of research.

[GreyWolfe]

Please don’t give up on your kids. Most of them probably have not been taught another way. It is your duty to show them. I was that inner-city student who thought I was a great writer because my poor, Black inner-city Baltimore schools taught me that copying out of the encyclopedia and dictionary were acceptable. My primary school teachers gave me straight-A’s simply because I would copy out of the book, as compared to the students who didn’t even bother to read a book. It wasn’t until I attended a fabulous magnet school that I was even introduced to the concept of plagiarism. My eleventh-grade English teacher took the time to teach me how to cite a reference, paraphrase, and form my own view based on other’s opinions. To this day I credit this teacher (Jane Parker, now head of Baltimore Polytechnic Institute’s English Department) for laying my writing foundation. You may not think that what you are doing makes a difference, but I am proof that it does.

BSEE/MSIA/MBA Carnegie Mellon University
MPA/PhD (abd) Harvard University
Published author

[R. Contreras]

Hello,

My school uses a website that identifies student papers with a plagiarism percentage. The website is www.turnitin.com, and it identifies if the student "copied" from the internet or from another student (students who uses the website). It really deters student plagiarism. If a student turns in a high percentaged plagiarized paper, I simply do not accept it.

Hope this helps!

[James E. Powell]

I agree with evelyn; your response to plagiarism should be short and definitive.

Your students all know that plagiarism is wrong. They don't need a lecture or an explanation about plagiarism; they need to know that you will not tolerate it. They were testing you to see if you care enough to make them work. Expect further tests of your will and integrity.

Unsolicited advice.

Some students do this because they are unwilling to do the work. Some do it because they do not believe they are capable of acceptable work.

Convince them that you are only interested in their becoming better writers and that if they trust you and work with you, you are certain that they will become better writers.

Build the student's confidence in writing by focusing on small, measurable goals with each assignment. Whatever you have in your rubric, include the question, "Is this student's writing improving?" every time you grade.

Lavish praise on each and every gain. Make sure the parents know.

[margaret]

Is your administrator trying to say that your students are really highly capable but hiding their lights under a bushel because you would never believe they could write a decent essay on their own? That is not the same as the statement following, that they didn't do the assignment on their own because they felt they couldn't. These are both interesting possibilities, but they are not on the same train of thought! Your administrator is looking for politically correct ways to excuse the intellectual crime of plagiarizing.

Evelyn gave you some excellent feedback on offering more structure in your assignment; all students need something to fall back on; they do not want to try to operate in a vacuum. I imagine that their writing skills are lower than you had expected them to be, and you are feeling defeated before you begin.

There are many excellent templates for student writing. Don't feel bad about using them. They are llike the training wheels on a bike. But plagiarism is like taking an airplane to the finish line in a bicycle race and really has nothing to do with the learning process at all.

[Dr. Robert Seaman]

Discovering the motivation for students failing to complete their reading and writing assignments is important. Are they capable and just lazy? How can they have an inferiority complex if they are capable of the tasks? One does not feel inferior for being lazy. In fact, being lazy may be an indicator that the student is not being challenged enough, that he is bored with the assignment, that it's too easy for him. In my experience, reading and writing is difficult even for the student who can read at grade level. So, how difficult will the assignments be if YOUR STUDENTS ARE READING SIGNIFICANTLY BELOW GRADE LEVEL. How do you find out? Give them the STAR reading test. I bet you'll be shocked to discover that 70 to 80 percent of your students read significantly below grade level. If that is true, then the most probable reason for their lack of motivation is SHAME. They are ashamed of their minds because they cannot read fluently enough to complete the assignment. Check out childrenofthecode.org, and then tell me if all these "cultural" theories don't collapse under the weight of quality data.

[Dr. Robert Seaman]

Maybe those plagarizing students suffer from low literacy. Check out your CST scores. Give them the STAR reading test. Any questions?

[Allison]

You must be joking. Several dozen students at MIT were caught having plagiarized in a computer programming course. A dozen students at the Naval Academy were caught for having cheated on tests. Similar events happen at Harvard and Yale--both plagiarism and cheating. And you think your kids did it because they think POORLY of themselves?

they did it because they couldn't be bothered to do the work. Plain and simple. Same reason as all of the above kids at prestigious instituions. Until you teach them that there are REAL NEGATIVE CONSEQUENCES they will not stop.

[Tom]

Seems like the pivotal issue here has been overlooked: personal accountability.

The students cheated, period. For that they should be held accountable, even beyond a grade of zero.

It seems that more and more reality comes second to wishful and selfish desires—and, yes, sloth.

If family and community won't draw the line, show the way, then educators must.

[David]

My experience as an inner-city English teacher has been that, unfortunately, some administrators climb the career ladder by perfecting somewhat elaborate explanations for unacceptable behavior, in the mantra of "understanding" the inner-city student's unique challenges. Do you honestly believe your administrator's explanation that "[your students] ‘dumbed down’ their essays to a level so far below their actual writing abilities because they thought it would be more believable to [you] that way"?
Evelyn's lesson advice is quite useful. Put aside your anger, realize that some students need a clearer, more structured assignment, and teach writing as a process, not as homework. Use peer editing and require multiple drafts for each assignment, with all drafts submitted with the final draft, to make copying irrelevant. Let them appreciate each others' writing, and grow as writers. There's no point in failing students who copied. Just tell them it's unacceptable, and have them do it again, with a better lesson plan.

[David]

Lauren,
You might put aside your anger, and use the plagiarism occurrence as an educational opportunity. Teach them that copying is acceptable, but only under certain conditions, and with attribution to the primary source (in this case, a classmate). Given the fact that your students may be in college a year from now, they may benefit from the experience that made you angry. Maybe one of them will be the next Baltimore GreyWolfe, and you the next Jane Parker.

[Ben Brown]

iI cannot say I blame the kids for so-called "plagerism". We have evolved into a cheating culture, with the Florida 2000 election as the apex. The Bush administration clearly is a Kleptocracy. With horrific cost in Iraq in the form of blood and treasure it appears that in so as far as cheating goes we should look to the top rather than at these children.

These children learn this behavior through the corrupted Spiritus Mundi of which our President and congress are responsible.

[john]

I think some excellent suggestions have been posted, e.g., by evelyn and GreyWolfe.

A point I'd add is to let other students know, without details, that you caught students plagerizing. Reason - before breaking rules many people consider if they expect to be caught. Teachers and administrators often try to keep instances of plagerism private for various (legit) reasons, but secrecy means nobody knows how often it does get caught. Same way drivers slow down when they see that a cop has pulled over another driver, the reminder that people get caught is a partial deterence - at least for some.

BTW - this publicity aspect is part of a plagerism policy I helped set at a University of Chicago graduate school program, so I definitely agree with Allison who doubted self-esteem as a cause of plagerism. Understanding root cause motivation is interesting and may even be helpful, but certainly should not come at the cost of clarity of the message - cheating is wrong. Many may do it, but it is potentially very costly to be caught.

Good luck.

[spaz]

When I caught students copying, I gave them an aggregate grade, say 82%, then split it evenly among the plagiarists, so, each student would get 20.5%. You might as well take the time now to teach them the lesson that plagiarizing will result in unpleasant consequences. If they get caught doing it in college, they will certainly fail the class and face additional sanctions, possibly suspension.

[Chelsea]

Lauren,
Please let us know what you chose to do. I would like to know how the teens, their parents and your administrators reacted to your actions. I vote for the 0 grade and give the class a stern warning that you have noted that names of suspected cheaters and that even a hint of plagiarism is cause for an F in your class and suspension from school (or whatever your school's policy is).
I think that most students cheat because it is easy. Apathy, not malice, usually is the winning team.

[Tom L]

What a sad story, but one that is probably repeated in many school districts. I look at this as a unique opportunity to teach these students an important lesson. I agree with Evelyn, that they should be given a grade of 0. But notify them they have one chance to redeem themselves, by each writing an original 5-PAGE paper on ethics, honesty, plagiarism, counterfeiting or theft of ideas. There are hundreds of examples which they can research (1976 West Point cadet cheating scandal, the previously named 1994 Annapolis midshipmen scandal, the late historian-author Stephen Ambrose's plagiarism, US dollar counterfeiting by North Korea, unsafe counterfeit aircraft parts from China, Jason Blair of the New York Times, illegal downloading of copyrighted music or movies, just to name just a few.)

The kids will learn a lot about the subject they choose, as well as a lot about themselves.

[NWP]

I recommend looking at the resources of the National Writing Project, a professional development organization for teachers.

Also check out this article, "Where Writing Really Begins."
http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/resource/2143

[James Allen]

"iI cannot say I blame the kids for so-called "plagerism". We have evolved into a cheating culture, with the Florida 2000 election as the apex. The Bush administration clearly is a Kleptocracy. With horrific cost in Iraq in the form of blood and treasure it appears that in so as far as cheating goes we should look to the top rather than at these children."

It is amazing to me that some folks always want to point to Bush and the war as the reason for every bad thing that happens. These very same people will excuse these children because of 'the top' instead of teaching them personal responsibility.

[Mark]

Maybe your students are as uninspired as I was when I was given assignments in high school that seemed like a waste of my time.

[Paulie]

Writing is becoming a lost art, especially for High Schoolers. When I taught 9-12, I had the following arrangement with my students: Write an essay (not a bio) on any subject and the points will be pure bonus - added to your grade. I tried to make it unheard of to fail or get a poor grade in my classes. In five years, not one essay reached my desk. Sad. Oh, and by the way - all of my students were sent to school by their parents with iPods and Gameboys in their backpacks. Tese two electronic devices are King in my schools - I could never overcome this addiction.

[Tom J]

Rubbish. Tell all the students who turned in the same essay to meet you after class as a group, and then ask them to explain to you just how and why this happened. You might learn something. Clue: they're probably bright enough to have figured out you would notice the papers were identical, so it's likely they didn't realize what they did was actually wrong. Discuss plagiarism, then ask them to write an essay about what it is, why it's wrong, and how it's unhelpful to a student's learning process.

[Ben Brown]

I'm not excusing the children for this behavior. I am not in the "blame Bush for everything" crowd. Virtually all administrations, from Nixon on (with the possible exception of Carter) were just as corrupt and incompetent as Bush. But let's get real...the pandemic of governmental scandals and such permeates through our skulls daily and this simply must affect the kids.

In so as far as leading by example I know teachers are disciplined and dedicated group (I substitute taught in the Long Beach School District for a couple of years in the early 90's) . But the few hours a day of this positive exposure is simply not enough. With dysfunctional families, church scandals, Enron-type crimes and corruption rampant through our elected leaders makes a decision for a youngster to cheat on a school assignment much easier.

Things need to change across the board...our Minds, as well as those of our children, are becoming silly putty.

[Stewart Van Buskirk]

It isn't just a problem with plagerizing with writing. I teach visual art and in my class it takes the form of trying to have another student draw for them. In my opinion it is a cop-out. They don't want to put forth the effort and it is just easier for someone else to do it.

[M. David Lopez]

The real reason students plagiarize is that they are asked to write about things that they either don't care about or don't understand. It's truly hard to inspire students to write openly and honestly without fear of being marked down with a red pen for "getting it wrong."

The few essays and written responses that I assign are indeed part of a process, as Tom above points out.

I've always believed that the reason we use writing in classrooms was not only to assess students' learning, but to measure their ability to express themselves, to argue and support their opinions.

This is far from the multiple choice mentality we've grown accustomed to.

[evelyn]

Unfortunately, writing and the ability to express yourself is becoming more important in our society and while I applaud Mr. Lopez for using stimulating issues to get his students to write, it can't always be "all about me."

Students will have to write to describe and analyze. They will at times have to write about things they "don't care about." They might not care because their parents have not taken the time to teach them to care about the world. Just because it is not important to the student does not mean it is not important.

If we let the unsophisticated/defiant student drive what is important rather than explaining why it is important (example: genocide) then we have failed as educators. I never let the bottom half of my class drive my instruction. I know that sounds rude and blunt, but I never allow the taggers and truants to decide what is relevant and what is not. That goes to the students who show effort and some initiative. These may be D students or A students but what they all have in common is that they have been socialized for school and they make some effort to learn.

Does it mean I don't care about those who act like they don't care? Of course I care. But I realize that often maturity issues are at play and that these students often have to experience some life lessons that I cannot impart to them. They will have to suffer through some experiences that other students don't to grow up. It is an unfortunate reality but true. Being a good example is often the best you can do for some students. I have seen some of these former students and most apologize and say they were young and stupid. Most will do fine but you won't be able to help all in a school setting. Be kind, be helpful but never let them drive your instruction.
Again, advice you will never hear in your credential program.