So two students just submitted their final essays. Both essays consist of a very clumsy retelling of an egregiously inane article from SparkNotes. One of the students had already been caught plagiarizing in this course.
I have given two detailed and passionate lectures about plagiarism in this course. I have put up a warning to use NO online sources in the writing of the essay a) on Blackboard, b) in 3 PowerPoint presentations, c) on the syllabus, d) on the essay instructions.
And the very first two essays I get are plagiarized from SparkNotes. I mean, really? What’s fucking wrong with these kids? They pay money they don’t have, get into debt, and all for what? To copy-paste garbage from stupid SparkNotes instead of learning?
Also, what a brilliant idea to put the prof in a vile mood one week before the end of the semester.
I have a ton of work to do right now but I’m immobilized by this insult that I in no way deserve.
Clarissa's Blog 
I spent all goddamn day yesterday reading and discussing Kant and post-Kantian aesthetic theory and on top of that had to essentially wing a dissertation topic on the spot for one of my profs and these little shits just can’t be bothered it makes me want to step on them like Mario on a turtle.
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They should get Fs. Specially the one who has already been caught plagiarizing. As we would say in my country, “Te esta tomando el pelo”.
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And the one who plagiarized before submitted the essay to me with an email saying that she doesn’t feel good about the essay. Can you believe the gall??? She submits it early just to see whether I will catch her.
Disgusting.
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I would have pretended it was find then busted her ass on the day they were due.
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Yes! I’m nice to them. And this is the nice, kind person they offend in this way.
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At my university, if you got caught once, AND admitted to it, you could go through a process where you and the prof could work out a solution.
If you argued that you did NOT plagiarize, you had a panel hearing and if it was determined that you did plagiarize, minimum punishment was an F in the course. (For first violation).
2nd violation you get expelled automatically.
If Clarissa didn’t report the first one through official channels, maybe can’t do much, but they should definitely fail the course. That’s the only way the point will be made to them that it’s WRONG.
Clarissa, what is your university’s policy on this stuff?
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No more nice Clarissa. Sounds like it’s time to rage.
I never found Sparknotes helpful for anything other than a brief summary. Why would one even plagarize from it?
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I have already dispensed with the oral presentations, the research paper, the free topic paper. All because of plagiarism.
Now all that’s left is to cancel the entire writing component of the course for good because I don’t want to waste my time and energy on fishing for plagiarists.
Yes, I’m very angry.
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I wouldn’t do that. You mentioned downthread that these are freshmen? Be hard on them. I can almost guarantee they got away with it in high school-tell them once, at the beginning of the semester, what plagarism is, then tell them anyone who gets caught will get an automatic ‘F’ for the course, and reported to the university. Scare them.
If you’re feeling particularly evil, tell them that when this happens, the university will send a letter to their parents. They’ll pee their pants.
Hope you feel better.
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Can I ask what the essay / SparkNotes article was about?
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Julio Cortazar’s short story “The Continuity of Parks.” It’s a VERY short story. And they can’t read it on their own? That’s just ridiculous.
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I just read the story. It was awesome.
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Thank you, now I know I could get at least one person to read it. 🙂 Now tell me, is it that impossibly hard to write 4 double-spaced pages analyzing it?
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Hell you’d be lucky if I didn’t hand in ten pages.
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Sometimes I feel pity for people who plagiarize who obviosuly think their opinions are worth nothing. It is the ultimate demonstration of an extremely low self esteem. O f course, plagiarism cannot be excused but the people who practise it are frequently frightened their ideas might be considered stupid, inane and shapeless.
By the way, I am an Italian teacher of Spanish, so I know what I am talking about…
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I told the students many times (and demonstrated with actual examples) that most of what they can find through Google searches is unreliable and very low in quality. I told them that after taking an entire course on this, they are much better qualified to write an essay about the subject than anybody who posts crap on Wikipedia or SparkNotes.
In any case, it’s nice to have an Italian teacher of Spanish on the blog. 🙂 Now my mood is slowly improving. 🙂
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Give that student a F, period. The administration will back you.
To avoid plagiarism, I try to find less common readings. Professors seem to propose the same readings in every university, am I wrong?
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At least they must cite this online source, and back it off with real source.
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or personal stuff.
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Any studentr wo plagiarizes should be reportted to thu Universitry hopnors Committee witha recommendation for expulsion. That is the best protection you csan provide for the value of dregree.
Do not hesitate. Save the rest of your students by eliminating the refuse.
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That’s precisely what I said to them, that their plagiarism erodes the value of the degree for everybody. Yet, this continues. 😦
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You know, every freaking class of every freaking semester from the start of high school to the end of college we were reminded what plagiarism was. We were told how to properly cite sources to prevent accidental plagiarism. We were reminded that we would get caught and told how we could get caught. We were told the stupidest stories about people getting caught and we laughed at them and said, “How could anyone think they would get away with that?”
And every time one of my professors talks about catching a plagiarizer the story seems to include a detail about the student claiming not to know the definition of plagiarism. And I JUST DO NOT GET IT. How can you honestly claim that you thought the assignment was to look up a Wikipedia article, copy and paste it, and add your name at the top? Not freaking likely. And because of these morons I keep getting lectures on what plagiarism is because apparently the school administrators honestly believe teachers aren’t explaining it well enough, and they tend to favor the students in the arguments. If someone gets caught plagiarizing the least they can do is be honest about it. Maybe we can have a conversation about the reasons students actually do things like this (stress, panic, feelings of inferiority, desperation, maybe even blunt apathy) and figure out how to deal with the real reasons this happens instead of pretending that plagiarism is just soooo complicated and hard to understand.
At any rate this is just LAZY plagiarism and I do not feel much sympathy for your students. I can imagine a hypothetical situation where a student is stressed out, maybe due to work overload, homework overload, medical issues, are a combination thereof, and in a desperate attempt to get everything done turns in plagiarized work. I don’t think it’s right, but I get that that happens. I’ve never done it but I’ve been tempted to. (I know the better option is to do the papers for your least understanding professors and to ask for extensions when necessary, and I think teachers should be more willing to let students do this and to let them know this is an option.) But we’re not talking about that when someone plagiarizes freaking Spark Notes. That’s just insulting.
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“And every time one of my professors talks about catching a plagiarizer the story seems to include a detail about the student claiming not to know the definition of plagiarism. And I JUST DO NOT GET IT.”
-I don’t get it either! I’d respect an honest person who admits they cheated instead of somebody who keeps treating me like an idiot and telling me, “Oh, I didn’t know using critical sources (Wikipedia and SparkNotes, with no attribution) was cheating.”
“And because of these morons I keep getting lectures on what plagiarism is because apparently the school administrators honestly believe teachers aren’t explaining it well enough, and they tend to favor the students in the arguments.”
-I know! I always feel like I;m stealing the time of the good students who have to sit through these endless explanations about plagiarism that they don;t deserve. But I have no choice because I’m not allowed to single anybody out.
” I can imagine a hypothetical situation where a student is stressed out, maybe due to work overload, homework overload, medical issues, are a combination thereof, and in a desperate attempt to get everything done turns in plagiarized work. I don’t think it’s right, but I get that that happens.”
– The thing is that I’m the most understanding person in the world about these issues. They have to know by now that if they come and share this honestly with me, I will always do all I can to be helpful and find a solution.
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One thing I tend to think I’ve noticed about Americans (although they will generally disagree with me on this) is that having the right form is very important for them. They seem to believe there is only one right form, in many instances, and that all others are inadvertent corruptions or deviations. Thus, if you look at American “boxercize” videos they almost always depict a scenario where robot man (or woman) goes to war. The gender roles are viciously delineated and the movements are an extreme interpretation of transformer toys dancing for appreciation.
Australians, I think, have the opposite tendency, to accept a great deal of formlessness.
The differences are quite palpable.
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I’d rather get a B because I ran out of things to say and didn’t quite hit the five-page minimum (it happened) than to get any grade due to plagiarism (or cheating in any form, for that matter).
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Why don’t these students have the same sense of dignity and honor? And there are so many of them. . .
Of course, all of the cheaters are freshmen, the same people 60% of whom will not finish the degree. The higher level students don;t plagiarize. Not a single person in my 300-level literature class cheated on a single on of the 3 essays last semester. It’s the freshmen who will drop out because of such laziness who do it.
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The only way to stop plagiarism is to punish it severely. You need next year’s students to hear how the academic career of two students was ruined all for the want of writing four double spaced pages using their own initiative.
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When I got obviously plagiarised essays, like copied from a text book, then if they don’t cite the source, they get 0%. If they cite the source they got 25%, which is still a fail, but some points for honesty.
One of my students did that. The entire essay was copied from the study guide, which I wrote. And he didn’t cite it. So he got 0.
First for plagiarising.
Secondly for plagiarising me
Thirdly for boring me by expecting me to read stuff wrote on the offchance that there might be an original sentence or two lurking in there.
Fourthly for not citing the source.
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Is it really that hard to just fail them and move on to the one’s who are actually doing the work? The truth is you will always encounter shit heads in life. It doesnt matter how much you say or do to try and change this fact. Time to live up to your value’s and give them the hammer. 🙂
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I know but I can’t stop feeling very angry and personally insulted by this.
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Give a “0” to those cheaters, do nothing else, and move on, they’ll not be back.
“If they cite the source they got 25%, which is still a fail, but some points for honesty. ”
This is not plagiarising, this is just a bad work.
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