Directorate of Human Resources Student plagiarism Deterring, detecting and dealing with it Jude Carroll

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development What I plan to cover What is plagiarism? The size of the problem. What kinds of plagiarism are a problem? What is the best way to tackle the problem? Why a holistic approach is needed Threats to a holistic approach The problems of under-detection, under-reaction False ideas about ‘proof’ How electronic detection tools might help

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Plagiarism is a decision (not always an informed decision…….) Doing something about plagiarism means investigating how students make decisions. How can we [teachers + support staff such as Librarians, study skills tutors etc + institutions] influence them?

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Question: …tell me about how you write essays? ‘Generally I go for a Google search. Just type in the title or work out key points. I see if I can find some research or something written by academics or various universities or something. ….then if I don’t find anything within 10 minutes, 15 minutes, I’ll go for the [books]. I don’t know why. Just to see if someone’s written the essay for me, I suppose. I was lucky once [so] I just try again.

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Q: …tell me about how you write essays.. We don’t have essays in my country. I never had to do it and now, I do. We don’t have writing what I think in my country; we just have writing what the book says, what the teacher says. I can writing what the book says. But here, I read books, good English, the people who write books, and I don’t write good English. If I bad marks, I might go back. Maybe I can learn but never as good as in books or internet. So I write that.

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Q: how you write essays? The truth? I don’t. My parents do what they can then I just buy something. Last time, I paid a friend. I work 40 hours a week. What do you expect me to do?

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Q: …tell me about how you write essays.. What might your students answer?

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development First way to influence decisions: make sure students understand what we want make sure students understand the definitions

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development ‘submitting someone else’s work as your own’ ‘work’What is that? ‘someone else’s work’ How can work belong to others? ‘my own work’ What makes work belong to me? ‘submitting’What is OK before submitting?

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development ‘Submitting someone else’s work as your own’

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development ‘Passing off someone else’s work as your own work’ (Anon) OR ‘Creating a false assumption in an assessor by borrowing, without specific acknowledgement, from other published or unpublished work’ (source?)

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Activity: ‘When in this list does the student create a false assumption in the assessor as to what is ‘his/her own work’? In 2’s, decide when students cross the line

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development What is plagiarism? The size of the problem. What kinds are most problematic? Why a holistic approach is needed Threats to a holistic approach The problems of under-detection, under-reaction, and the myths about ‘proof’ How might tools like ‘Turnitin’ help?

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Most worries about plagiarism….. misconduct & cheating Most cases of plagiarism …. misunderstanding and misuse of the rules of citation and attribution

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Size of the problem ‘I regularly cut-and-paste without attribution’ [US study] 1999: 13%; 2003: 41%; 2004: 43% ‘how many students make up data in their projects?’ [UK study in HE] 20% ‘what percentage of work is downloaded? [UK study] ,000 HE papers; 13% with more than 75% matching text ‘use of ghost writing and purchase’ [2005: UK supplier claims sale of 1000 scripts weekly; self-report statistics from students about 5 per 1000] And Sweden?

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development

I told them about plagiarism so they definitely know about it but I still get it. What’s wrong with them? “ ”

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Teaching is not just telling Teaching skills needs practice, feedback, more practice….. NOT plagiarising takes skill + knowledge

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development The HOLISTIC approach Understanding ‘the rules of the game’ Teaching the skills Designing out easy cheating opportunities Designing in ways of monitoring + checking activity Creating a ‘no blind eyes’ culture A range of detection strategies Procedures that do not penalise the ‘whistle-blower’ Agreeing what makes a proven case Dealing with cases quickly, consistently, defensibly

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Activity: how holistic is your university? Look at the handout. With a colleague, put x, xx and o beside each element Where, do you think, is the place to start?

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development designing in Assessment tasks that compare, evaluate, collect, catalogue, rank, justify, plan, etc Local, recent, specific, personalised tasks Setting task-specific requirements [use this theory, that book, some primary data etc] Tracking and valuing the ‘making’ process itself * Authentication activities (checking ‘who did this work?’) * my favourite

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Designing out X ‘Show you know’ questions for essays X All marks only for the final product X Re-using the same tasks X Shared mark in a group task X Setting everyone a single-answer task / problem X Using coursework to assess knowledge / understanding

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Threats to a holistic approach? ‘Too hard’ Dreams about the power of ‘catch-and-punish’ Fear of legal consequences Myths about how much proof Outdated policies and procedures Too much trust in ‘electronic detection’

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development What is plagiarism? The size of the problem. What kinds are most problematic? Why a holistic approach is needed Threats to a holistic approach How might electronic detection tools like ‘Turnitin’ help?

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Issues around detection Over-use of a small number of strategies Under-use of electronic means Not always efficient – too much evidence gathering long after the case is made Detection without the holistic approach damages relationships and may damage learning

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Your own favourite strategy? Look at the ‘GM crops’ exercise. Can you see clues that this is not the student’s own work?

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development Turnitin.com Text-matching tool Three databases Widely used around the world and in UK Problems and positives Needs to be part of a holistic approach!

Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development