Student plagiarism: deterring it, detecting it, dealing with it

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Student plagiarism deterring it, detecting
it,dealing with it

• Jude Carroll, Oxford Brookes University

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This is my plan for this lecture

• -Defining plagiarism. What kinds of student
  plagiarism are a problem in 2007? ..in
  Iceland?
• -A holistic approach is needed to deal with
  plagiarism. Describing the parts in a holistic
  approach
• -teaching students the necessary skills
• -designing programmes and designing tasks
• -effective detection
• -what makes a case?
• -matching the level of breaking the rules with
  the consequences
• -explaining why appropriate policies are central
  to a holistic approach.

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• Plagiarism is defined as submitting someone
  elses work as your own

What is OK to share before I hand in my work?
How can work belong to others?
What makes work belong to me?
work What is that?
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Do students understand what plagiarism is?

• Students must link the idea of plagiarism to
  their everyday decisions
• Activity Which are plagiarism?

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Students ask themselves questions

• Ok, here is an assignment. How do I do it..
• Can I find the answer?
• Has someone already answered this? Has a fellow
  student done it?
• How hard is it? Can I do a good answer? Is it
  worth spending the time?
• How much time will it take? If I do it, what
  else will suffer?
• If I fake it or copy it, will I be caught?
• If I am caught, what are the likely
  consequences?
• Most students do the assignment.
• A growing number answer with plagiarism,
  intentionally or unintentionally.

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Influencing students decisions 1

• Make sure the students know what teachers expect
• Make sure students have the necessary skills to
  do what is expected
• Make sure students see their everyday decisions
  as linked to academic integrity

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• If the person marking your work cannot tell
  whether they are marking your work or someone
  elses work, that person might wonder, Is it
  plagiarism?
• You create a false assumption for your assessor
  if you borrow others work (published or
  unpublished) and do not say right there in the
  text where it comes from.

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What explains our interest in student plagiarism?

• Academics give credit for learning
• Learning is demonstrated by understanding
• Understanding is demonstrated by change (in you
  or in the work)
• So
• No change, then no understanding
• No understanding, then no learning
• No learning, then no credit

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Misunderstanding what we mean by learning leads
to plagiarism

• Copying from other students
• Copying from books, from the internet, from
  previous work
• Collecting chunks of text from the Web and
  sticking them together
• Hardly changing the original authors words or
  changing them in superficial ways
• Students bypass any evidence of understanding

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Poor use of citation rules leads to plagiarism

• -Some text quoted, some not marked as quotations
• -Some text cited correctly, some lifted but not
  cited.
• Wrong decisions and actions lead to plagiarism
• -Submitting the same piece of work twice
• -Sharing work with fellow students who then use
  it to do their own work
• -Over- use of editing proofreading
• -Sub-contracting work which seems not important
  
• Marker is not sure whose work is being judged

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Misconduct and cheating leads to plagiarism

• -Paying someone buying an assignment
• -Finding it (or most of it)
• -Copying most (or all) and hiding the fact
• -Handing in someone elses answer or work
• -Lying about your contribution to the group
• -Deliberately disguising your breach of the rules

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Most worries about plagiarism are about
misconduct cheatingMost cases of plagiarism
come from misunderstanding and poor use of the
rules of citation and attributionQ Are
university policies designed to deal with the
small number of deliberate cheaters . or the
large and growing number of unintentional cases?

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Dealing with plagiarism requires a holistic
approach

• Understanding the rules of the game
• Teaching students the skills
• Designing out easy copying designing in
  apprenticeship
• A range of detection strategies
• Agreeing How serious? High, medium, low?
• Agreeing what proves a case
• Procedures that do not punish whoever spots it
• Fair, consistent, defensible penalties

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Discussion activity

• How holistic is your university?
• Where are the strengths?
• Where are the gaps?

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• I told them about plagiarism so they definitely
  know about it but I still get it.
• Whats wrong with them?

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Influencing Decisions 2 Teach students the
skills they will need.

• If I told you how to play cricket, could you play
  it?
• Could you play it well?
• What would you need to be a good cricket player?

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• Analysing
• Evaluating
• Paraphrasing and summarising
• Structure
• Mining texts to support opinions
• REFERENCING

• taking apart creating answering
  sub-questions
• making judgments about value, reliability,
  authority
• others words and ideas
• what order to put things in subheads, paragraphs
• Using others authority

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Influencing decisions 3 Focus on course design
Focus on task design

find it?
fake it?
make it?
do it?
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• designing in practice
• Induction
• Diagnosis
• Skills development
• Feedback
• Practice

• designing out easy cheating
• Novelty - context/format
• Specificity - local, recent, personal,
  individual, unique
• Higher-order cognitive skills

• Assess the process
• Authenticate the author

YES rank, justify, choose, revise, interpret,
analyse, invent, plan NO knowledge (eg.
describe, state), basic understanding
(explain). NO generic application
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Influencing decisions 5 Use a wide range of
detection strategies.
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Detection is a process..
suspicion
action
investigation
confirmation
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Final stages dealing with cases

• How much evidence?
• Classifying the seriousness
• Matching penalty to the level of breach
• Keeping records
• Monitoring and learning from data

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