 I added necessary explanations and interpretations after supporting evidence.

 I extended conclusion paragraph in which I summarized my main points and

talked about positive consequence of implementing educative measures.

 I added references in APA.

 I corrected informal, personal and non-specific wording. For example, I replaced

“can work well” with “can be effective”; I changed “ I don’t deny . . .” into “ It is

reasonable to agree that”; I also switched general sentences to specific sentences

related to my topic.

 I modified sentence structures, articles and ambiguous pronouns. For example, I

added “a” before “flood”.

In recent years, a great majority people started to emphasize the importance of

original and academic honesty has gained wide attention. As is indicated in a study

(Reifman, 2012) that assesses possible types of cheating, 80% of students had

plagiarizing behaviors. In order to deal with academic dishonesty, scholars and

experts come up with their opinions. Some people think deterrence can be effective in

alleviating cheating while others hold the opposite view. Critics argue that strict

penalty cannot encourage students to maintain integrity, and the most effective way

should be guiding students in internalizing the values of integrity. In terms of

effectiveness, internalizing the values of integrity in better than deterrence. The

reasons are as follows.

Firstly, realizing the significance of academic honesty is more important in the long

run. Only if schools teach students why honesty is vital and how they can perform

well without cheating, will students spare no effort in avoiding academic treason.

Therefore, schools should fulfill the educative function and take measures to help

students refuse cheating. An example of this was given by Reifman(2012). He noted

that Texas Tech University highlighted the academic honesty by setting an ethics

center and invited prominent experts to present topics about cheating. These kind of

speeches can make students realize harmful effects of cheating and then refuse

plagiarizing from their inner hearts. Reifman(2012) mentioned an example about

doctor as well. If a doctor had cheated in medical school, may be no one would be

willing to be his/her patient. Therefore, every time when students want to take a free

riding, they will recall experts’ words and this “doctor” example. These memory to

some extent can remind them to be honest to academic performance and to

themselves and then be responsible to their future careers.

Secondly, instructors’ guidance can be considered as a preventive measure for

cheating. Beforehand guidance and education will assist students to gradually

internalize the values of integrity and encourage them to advocate and respect original

work. Just as what Chinese government has done for natural disasters such as a flood

and earthquake, government’s preventive measures can be helpful in minimizing the

damage. If Chinese government does not build a dam in advance, floods can incur

much more loss and death. Sometimes, students do not want to cheat but do not know
their behaviors are dishonest. Therefore, instructors should specify plagiarizing

behaviors and give constructive guidance on how to refer to existing work without

direct copy. For example, instructors can teach students to paraphrase or summarize

researchers’ findings. If students know how to utilize scholars’ academic

achievements, they may not have motivations to cheat.

Although education is advantageous in avoiding plagiarism, opponents still hold the

idea that specific law will be more effective. They believe that stringent punishments

can force people to behave well. Several penalties were stated by Subedi(2017),

which include expelling from schools or organizations and depriving academic degree.

These punitive measures can make people afraid to plagiarize and then regularize

their behaviors. In addition, supporters of deterrence believe that advanced

technology can be useful in detecting plagiarism. For example, inspectors can use the

anti-cheating application to check students’ papers against an enormous database of

thousands of existing academic papers(Subedi, 2017). It is reasonable to agree that

corresponding laws and technologies can be useful in reducing cheating to some

extent. However, deterrence can only make students fear the punishments while it can

not help them to realize how unworthy their actions are. In other words, students will

resist dishonest behavior out of fear rather than due to internalized honesty. Moreover,

for those students who cheat in their assignments or exams, once they are not caught,

they may commit it again. As for detecting technology, it isn’t imperfect. Although

there are some anti-cheating devices to detect plagiarism, there is anti-anti-cheating

software and advice as well. For example, most of detecting programs are not able to

identify images. If students copy directly from existing papers and convert

duplications into images, their work will not be identified as plagiarism. Therefore, no

matter stringent laws or advanced technologies, they don’t have adequate ability to

reduce incidence of plagiarizing radically.

As is discussed before, punishments can not assist people to voluntarily refuse

academic dishonesty and anti-cheating technologies can not function well sometimes.

Under this situation, education plays a major role of internalizing values of integrity

and guiding students to correctly and appropriately use previous studies for reference.

If school administrations take educative measures powerfully, students may gradually

internalize honesty and try to employ proper methods learned from instructors to

improve academic performance. In the long run, their academic ability and moral

level will be promoted. To sum up, education is a better way to prevent and avoid

academic dishonesty. Though it may be a long process, its effect will be significant.

Deterrence can be supplementary, but aren’t the main method.

Reference

Reifman, A. (2012, February 1). Academic dishonesty: Prevalent but preventable.

Retrieved September 10, 2017 from

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-campue/201202/academic-dishonesty-pre

valent-preventable

Subedi, P. (2017). Deterring academic plagiarism through technology and law.

Retrieved September 10, 2017 from

http://lokaantar.com/en/articles/deterring-academic-plagiarism-technology-law/