Article - How Schools Are Hurting The Fight Against Plagiarism - Plagiarism Today

7/1/2016 How Schools Are Hurting the Fight Against Plagiarism - Plagiarism Today
How Schools Are Hurting the Fight Against

Plagiarism
May 10, 2010
By their very nature, schools are supposed to be a place of
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education. Students, whether they are young children or
retirees, go to schools to learn and grow as human beings.
However, on matters of plagiarism, that seems to be less the case. Educators have been
quick to consider plagiarism a cheating issue, which it certainly is, but either ignore or
pay inadequate attention to the fact that it is also an education one.
Simply put, no one is born with the ability to understand the difference between
paraphrasing and original work, how to properly cite sources and when citation is
necessary. These are all things that have to be taught and learned and anything that
must be learned must be learned through some trial and error.
Unfortunately though, schools have created zero tolerance policies on plagiarism. While
these policies are wellintended, they actually do more to create a climate of fear among
students and that, in turn, creates not a desire to play honest, but a desire to try and
defeat the systems that check for plagiarism.
In short, educators have accidentally created a plagiarism war and, rather than
educating their students in how to cite sources correctly have, in many cases,
encouraged them to learn on their own how to better get away with plagiarism.
This is creating real consequences for both the education system and for content
creators outside, problems that are, in many cases, avoidable.
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The Biology of Plagiarism
In more ways than one, plagiarism is a bit like a virus (or more appropriately a bacteria)
in that it is an unwanted item that damages a healthy system. Like a virus, it can grow
and spread, often as students teach one another about plagiarism or help each other
commit the acts, and infect other parts of the system.
However, most importantly, plagiarism evolves in response to the environment. In that
regard, we can think of antiplagiarism software as being similar to an antibiotic. Useful
for detecting and stopping plagiarism initially but, through overuse, becomes less and
less effective.
The problem is that plagiarists have not responded to antiplagiarism checking software
by playing it straight and doing their own work, they’ve responded by changing how they
plagiarize and where they plagiarize from.
Though my evidence is merely anecdotal, it comes from talking with students and
administrators alike at various schools. When I talk to administrators about plagiarism,
most want to know about how to detect it more effectively, not how to prevent it. When
I talk to students about plagiarism, most want to know about how to beat the tools that
detect it (often through very sneaky questioning), not how to actually cite sources.
In my experience, only the most inept or lazy students get caught plagiarizing trivially.
Most are aware of the detection methods used and will either plagiarize from a source
under the radar, such as a bought essay from another student, or by modifying it heavily
enough to avoid detection, which can only be done with great effort in most case.
In short, students who want to plagiarize can do so with little fear of getting caught. It is
just a matter of increasing the effort put into it. However, with antiplagiarism tools
available, no student should want to plagiarize at all because the effort and time
required to avoid detection is equal to or greater than the effort of creating an original
work.
It seems illogical for students plagiarize but many still do. With either fear of getting
caught or a difficult task staring down at them, one would expect students would
respond with honesty. However, that is clearly not always the case.
The Climate of Fear
I remember when I was in college, one of my English
classes had a very tense day. The instructor told the class
that she could not return the papers from the previous
week as plagiarism had been detected in one of them. The
teacher invited to the student involved to come forward,
assumedly to receive a lighter punishment.
The students, all 30 of us, wondered who it was but were
more worried that it was us. Many of us began to talk openly about that fear saying
things like “I didn’t plagiarize but… I hope it wasn’t me.” The conversation then shifted
to specific quotes, missed citations and other mistakes, wondering if that triggered the
alarm.
We were informed the next class that the student had come forward and the matter had
been handled in private, much to everyone’s collective relief, but I realized that, as
students, we were not aware as to what constituted plagiarism. Discussions about
citation had been limited to the various styles and we were all unsure where the lines
were drawn.
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This was the climate that existed in the late 90s. Now, things are much worse as anti
plagiarism systems have become more prominent and are used by more and more
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schools. However, teachers don’t seem to be any more dedicated to instructing students
on issues of plagiarism, at least in many schools, and that is creating a very real sense
of fear with the submission of every assignment.
What Teachers Should Be Doing
The first thing educators need to do is focus on actually teaching about plagiarism.
Currently, in many schools, the “education” about plagiarism is limited to a few
paragraphs in a student handbook.
Writing courses, which are mandatory, need to teach more than just the mechanics of
writing a good paper, but also how to cite sources, paraphrase correctly and be a good
researcher. It seems simple but there seems to be a divide between what is taught in
writing classes and what is useful when creating actual assignments.
Also, instructors need to focus on crafting assignments that are resistant to plagiarism.
This includes topics that can not be easily copy/pasted and including inclass portions
that test knowledge away from access to outside sources.
Finally, there needs to be a recognition that there will always be a plagiarism problem
and that it can not be “stamped out”. The same as there are viruses and bacteria in even
the healthiest person, there will always be some cheating, even in the most honest
school.
If you accept that and deal with the cases that are caught, you’re much better able to
ensure that honest students don’t turn to plagiarism further down the road.
Bottom Line
Strict plagiarism enforcement without solid plagiarism education doesn’t make better
students, it makes better cheaters.
If schools are going to deal with the epidemic of plagiarism, they need to treat it more
like an actual infection and focus on allaround health rather than pumping in more quick
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fixes. The current path only makes cheaters more resistant to the methods that are used
to catch them and creates a climate of fear that is both counterproductive for learning
and can actually encourage cheating, since many students feel as if they are being
treated as such anyway.
Even worse for copyright holders is that these better cheaters, after graduation (or while
in school) often show a high level of disrespect for intellectual property of others.
Though not every file sharer or Web plagiarist is/was a plagiarist in school, or vice versa,
there is little doubt that rampant plagiarism in an academic environment erodes the
respect one has for honesty and other people’s work.
For the sake of academia and the creative world at large, it is crucial that school shift the
way they deal with plagiarism and find a more product approach to the problem.
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