Student Plagiarism appears to be of great concern within higher Education

NAME: GODWIN UGWUH COURSE: STUDY SKILLS FOR PROFESSIONALS (SSP) STUDENT NUMBER: b1045265 DATE: 12 February 2012

Student Plagiarism appears to be of great concern within higher Education February 12, 2012

Introduction The purpose of enrolling in a higher education institution is to gain knowledge, build a creative and independent sense of knowledge application. Students are expected to critique a subject without help; thus, involvement in Plagiarismwhich negates the objectives of higher educationis intolerable by most Universities in Britain and United States of America. This report aims to investigate the existence, and the degree of impact of Plagiarism in higher education. The report also covers research on the tools of Plagiarism used by cheatmotivated students, the counteraction and challenges of most Universities within the geographical region of study. What is Plagiarism? The etymology of Plagiarism dates back to 1621, from L. Plagiarius kidnapper, seducer, plunderer, used in the circumstance of literary thief by Martial (Harper 2010). Various definitions of Plagiarism exist, but most of its definitions imply the insincere use of data partial or full, direct or indirectof someones projectvirtual or physicalwithout acknowledging its source. All of the definitions of Plagiarism do not portray academic integrity. Plagiarism is an act that signifies a fall in moral and ethical values. As technology got easier, and more sophisticated the practice gained notoriety. Should Plagiarism be regarded as a case? As technology became advanced and affordable, acts of Plagiarism increased in frequency of use, and number of perpetrators. In a counter move Universities have raised the awareness of Plagiarism. A better way to buttress this argument is a web search for the word, PLAGIARISM, on the websites of major Universities in Europe and North-America: the search results from Harvard University, Princeton University, Stanford University, University of Oxford, University of Birmingham, and Sheffield Hallam University revealed tens, and hundreds of resources such as student handbooks on Plagiarism, Plagiarism research papers, code of practice, penalties, and more. The magnitude of information on the subject validates its regard as a case for concern. Statistics give a clearer position on the degree of Plagiarism: in a report by Trip (Trip 2011), a survey of college students by McCabe states that 40 percent confessed to plagiarising a few sentences in written assignments. Why is Plagiarism extensive? The internet, computers, and other electronic gadgets have provided an orchard of information to users. This comfort of access has created a culture of unethical academic practices amongst some students. Some students engage in deliberate acts of Plagiarism due to laziness of doing difficult
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Student Plagiarism appears to be of great concern within higher Education February 12, 2012

assignments; most times it is blamed on the pressure of writing to the teachers instruction of lengthy word limits. When students engage in such unethical practices uncaught, it gradually becomes an addiction: the adventurous nature of youth comes in, and the bigger picture becomes a league of crafty students sharing ideas on Plagiarism methods, and advancing its sophistication. A research on plagiarism on the popular web channel, YouTube, revealed an unbelievable ecosystem of cheat-motivated students sharing videos of their latest conquest of antiPlagiarism applications. In a video (jakes625PS3 2011) the student made use of an unsuspicious tool called Character Map, which is a character set of English and non-English signs. He used the mapping tool to assign zero-width spaces between words, which look normal and readable to the human eye, but distant in cohesion of words to Turnitin.com, and other digital applications. Another video (Kangle1234 2011) showed a student who revealed the secret use of Google Books to perpetrate Plagiarised acts; he took advantage of the image format of Google Bookswhich are scanned text instead of digital textto copy ideas of authors without referencing its source.Turnitin.com is not designed to detect unreferenced images. In same fashion as robbery and other crimes, Plagiarism continues in a string of tool sophistication on both sides of the law. Challenges facing anti-Plagiarism campaign The campaign against Plagiarism does not depict a universal coalition. The principal characters seem to be British and American Universities; some Universities from other regions seem to be indifferent or less concerned about Plagiarism. An internet investigation of top Chinese Universities ranked by Chinese University Alumni Association (Chinese Education Centre 2012) revealed no mention of Plagiarism. A search for Plagiarism on the websites of Peking University, Tsinghua University, and Zhejiang University showed no result. Furthermore, Ha, in a book by Neville (Neville 2010) writes that significant numbers of teachers in Vietnam do not demand citation and references of source materials from their students. These cultural differences and different standards of appraising academic integrity have created a weak front against Plagiarism on international scale. Most international students from the unconcerned institutions find it hard to adjust to the learning standards of British and American schoolsmost especially when English is their second language. Solutions to Plagiarism: Preventive or Punitive? There are records of Plagiarism in lower school grades (Trip 2011), so it is only logical and preventive to start education against Plagiarism in lower education institutions. Such move would create an early awareness of its negative academic impact amongst school kids: the need to respect existing ideas of others by referencing the source materials would be better appreciated at this stage.

Student Plagiarism appears to be of great concern within higher Education February 12, 2012

Another good method of discouraging Plagiarism is assigning students to projects that demand original ideas, judgement, evaluation, and justification; in turn rewarding them (Callison 2005). University of Birmingham, amongst other schools, has a Plagiarism agreement form which is mandated to be signed by its students (University of Birmingham 2011). The form contains a pledge to study within the schools code of conduct, and willingness to face disciplinary action when found guilty. Not all students heed to the preventive methods; therefore, there is a need to design disciplinary policies against such students. Most Universities in Britain and America punish plagiarism offenders by failing the student, suspension, expulsion, and permanent record entry of offence. An institution known as Academic Misconduct Benchmarking Research project, Amber (Tennant and Rowell 2010) have taken a step further by designing a national tariff for offences of Plagiarism. The intent of the research is to enable Universities to compare the tariff against their disciplinary systems (Attwood 2010), with the hope to achieve a consistent disciplinary policy across the education sector. The Plagiarism reference tariff assigns points based on the history of offence of the violator, extent of offence, level of education, and more. Then it penalises base on the points. Neither the preventive policy nor the punitive policy absolutely tackles Plagiarism; the combination of both policies poses a forcible deterrent to Plagiarism. Conclusion The methods of Plagiarism have advanced in tools and ease of access; its degree of perpetration has gone beyond an insignificant stage. It is just to regard Plagiarism as an issue. Most Universities are counteracting the negative trend through preventive and punitive policies. Its concern for the unethical practice is gaining appeal, and robust action is taken to reduce its future records of Plagiarism to an acceptable minimum. More should be done to regard this trend as an issue of international concern. A good advice to students; however, difficult to practice, is to encourage the presentation of thoughts with no antecedent in facts or literature, but done to the best of ones ability and knowledge (Columbia World of Quotations[Beckett, Samuel] 2012).

References
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Student Plagiarism appears to be of great concern within higher Education February 12, 2012 CHINESE EDUCATION CENTRE (2012). University in China-China Education Center. [online]. Last accessed 12 February 2012 at: http://www.chinaeducenter.com/en/university.php COLUMBIA WORLD OF QUOTATIONS[BECKETT, SAMUEL] (2012). Dictionary.com Quotes,Samuel Beckett. [online]. Last accessed 12 FEBRUARY 2012 at: http://quotes.dictionary.com/Let_our_conversation_now_be_without_precedent_in?__utma=1.471 591251.1328223233.1328223233.1328650828.2&__utmb=1.3.10.1328650828&__utmc=1&__utmx= -&__utmz=1.1328223233.1.1.utmcsr=%28direct%29|utmccn=%28sr=%28direct%29|utmccn=%28 HARPER, Douglas (2010). Plagiarism,define Plagiarism at Dictionary.com. [online]. Last accessed 12 February 2012 at: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/plagiarism JAKES625PS3 (2011). How to cheat turn it in.com[YouTube Video]. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tX8yj8T1ZpQ&feature=fvsr]. 12 FEBRUARY 2012. KANGLE1234 (2011). 100% WAY TO BEAT TURNITIN WHEN SUBMITTING ESSAYS[YouTube Video]. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BU_3HFCeOvE&feature=related]. 12 FEBRUARY 2012. NEVILLE, Colin (2010). Plagiarism. In: The complete guide to referencing and avoiding plagiarism. 2nd ed., Berkshire, Open University Press, 32-33. TENNANT, Peter and ROWELL, Gill (2010). Plagiarism Reference Tariff. [online]. Last accessed 12 February 2012 at: http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/Journals/THE/THE/17_June_2010/attachments/Plagiarism %20Reference%20Tariff.pdf TRIP, Gabriel (2011). Generation Plagiarism. ProQuest Education Journals, 114 (3), 2. UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM (2011). Plagiarism Form. [online]. Last accessed 12 February 2012 at: http://www.birmingham.ac.uk/Documents/college-eps/maths/ug/plagiarismform.pdf