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Plagiarism
in the universities
According to
the Oxford English Dictionary, the definition of plagiarism is ‘the
action or practice of taking someone else's work, idea, etc., and passing it
off as one's own; literary theft’[1].
In short, plagiarism is
actually stealing others’ ideas or work. However, many university students are
not aware of it and did not take it seriously. If you are one of the current
university students, it is not difficult for you to find that many friends and
classmates around you are more willing to copy others’ homework rather than do
it by themselves. Maybe, you are also one of the ‘copy cats’. However, the time
you duplicated others’ work, did you realize what you are doing is wrong, or
indeed, you just think that, “Woo, everyone is doing the same. He does, she
does and you do. I don’t see anything wrong with me.” So, if you do think in this
way, please kindly spend a few minutes to read through this passage. I am sure
it will change your attitude towards your own work. Trust me, it really helps!
With no doubt, in order to improve the improper situation, it is very important
for university students to understand the present situation, why it happens,
the consequence brings by committing plagiarism and how to solve the problem.
Adopting others’ ideas should be encouraged, but it should not be done in a
secretive way. As a student, we are always encouraged by the teachers to read
more and to explore more on the subject areas. It is a good thing to learn from
the scholars, the intellectuals or anybody who are more experienced in a
specific field. It can help to bring inspiration and broaden our horizons. New
ideas are often improved and developed from previous ideas. Most important
thing is to understand the correct way of showing the readers your source of
information. If not, you are plagiarizing. From my observation, it seems that
the problem is more serious among students from the Faculty of Engineering and
Faculty of Science. In my opinion, the major reason for this is that their
assignments often require the students to have logical thinking and this type
of homework is often quite challenging and time-consuming. In this case,
students will easily fall into the trap of plagiarism. However, this is only
part of the reasons for this issue. I will explore more on the reasons behind
in the later paragraphs.
Nowadays, many universities students
are found to be an offender of plagiarism. Actually, many youngsters tend to have
lower moral standard. They do not understand why this is a serious matter. It
is the similar case as downloading or uploading materials on the internet, they
feel that it is just ‘sharing’ things with others. In both cases, they will
feel that they are innocent, because what they do not cause any harm to the
others, it can also help others as well. They even feel that as long as they
are not selling it for anything, they are not doing anything wrong. They try to
use these reasons to justify their behaviors. These distorted view greatly
affected their ideas about what is right and what is wrong. Indeed, they are
harming somebody else’s interest, their act has no different as a thief, and
they use it in a way which is not what the producer planned and desired, and
they use it without the permission of the producers, although one is stealing
money and properties whereas the other is stealing others’ works and ideas
which can also be others’ intellectual properties. Both cases are not
acceptable.
You may wonder why the problem of
plagiarism arises among a lot of university students. There are a number of
reasons behind this phenomenon. Sometimes, it is very tempted for university
students to directly copy the information from different sources such as books
or websites. Some may notice that there is a problem, but they do not take it
very seriously, whereas others may even be unaware of it. The former will think
that copying may not be a right thing to do, but it is not a big deal as long
as they can complete their homework and have a good grade. The latter even do
it without noticing any problem, as they think that including some
intellectuals work is alright and appropriate. Carelessness can be another major
reason. They may not commit plagiarism intentionally, but they forget to
acknowledge the author or source of information. I think this is also the responsibility
of the primary and secondary teachers. When we were young, we often needed to
do some small research projects. The more relevant information we found, the
higher marks we would get. However, the teachers would seldom reinforce the need
of acknowledging the authors or the source of information. In this way, it is
very hard for the university students to get used to this way of presenting the
information. From my point of view, I think the popularity of using internet resource
also play a crucial role in encouraging plagiarism. Students can search
whatever information they need through the search engines through the internet
conveniently and it is so easy to directly copy different data and information
from the internet by simply a click. And it may seem to them that the
information belongs to the public, they failed to realize that what they have
obtained from the websites is actually a work from somebody. The information is
opened for the public, but does not belong to everybody. It is our right to
adopt the ideas or the information, but it is also our responsibility to
acknowledge the authors and to show the readers the true information.
They sometimes plagiarize by copying
from their classmates as well. This habit dated back to the secondary school
years, when copying from others’ work is quite common in some schools. It was
very hard for the teachers to detect it, because the homework often requires
standard answers, and it misled the secondary students, causing them to feel
that plagiarism was not a very serious attempt. They do not have the idea of
plagiarism in mind. However, when they enter the university, they will
eventually discover that plagiarism is a very serious matter, as they may be
penalized quite severely. All these may have revealed a problem, that is, they
do not truly understand what plagiarism is. From a website about plagiarism,
you may find that there are many types of plagiarism, e.g. ‘the ghost writer’, ‘the photocopy’ or ‘the
misinformer’[2]
etc. If one is not careful enough, you may easily fall into the trap. After
reading from a book by Robert A. Harris (2001), I find out a few more possible
reasons contributing to plagiarism, e.g. ‘stress
and competition’, students’ ‘ poor time management and planning skills’ or’ somestudents fear that their writing ability is inadequate’[3],(
Harris, 2001)etc. As a student
myself, I must admit that it is more stressful for Hong
Kong students. In schools, students need to try very hard to gain
a good grade in their academic studies, because they are fear that they will
not have an excellent academic result for a good job with a great prospect.
However, our society not only required students to have good academic results,
but also excel in different areas. After class, they will need to enhance their
inter-personal skills by working for different committees, organizing different
activities for their departments or the colleges. In this way, they will have
less time for their studies. Nevertheless, many of them will also do part-time
jobs both for gaining working experience and for earning their livings. Life is
not easy for the universities students nowadays. They will need to try their
very best in the universities, engaging in different activities, trying to
overcome their inadequacy, but eventually some of them may have made use of a
wrong approach, that is plagiarism, especially when the assignment seems to be
quite challenging for them. However, I do think that these are no excuses for
doing anything wrong.
Increasing cases of plagiarism will
lead to serious consequences. It will be very unfair to the intellectuals and
those who share their ideas and their information through different sources
like books or internet. Those people may feel discouraged as people illegally
get the information without acknowledging them, hence, it will greatly affect
people’s willingness to do research and explore more in different areas and
also people’s creativity. Can you imagine what will happen if people stop
publish books or posting their ideas on the internet? There will be no more breakthroughs
in specific areas. To the students, if the teachers detect that there is
plagiarism in their work, the act of plagiarism will directly affect their
academic result and it will lower their confidence, they will in turn have
lower motivation in learning. And the students will not learn much during the process
of working on their assignments because when they are just copying from the
resources, they do not go through the process of understanding and
consolidating what they have learned. If more and more students tend to copy
instead of having their own ideas, then there will be less creativity in the
academic field. It will create a very bad learning atmosphere, because students
will not try their best to produce the best work, but only to rely on others.
Also, it is really unhealthy to have this habit in mind; they should understand
that there is nothing which can be unearned. In more serious cases, students
may not only fail in a course, but also receive some legal punishments. If the
authors sue the students for infringing their copyrights, they will be fined or
even imprisoned. In other words, it can possibly cause a profound effect in the
students’ lives.
However, what can we do to improve
the situation? After all, it is the attitude that matters. There can be both
short-term and long-term solutions. In order to reduce the number of plagiarism
cases immediately, it is important to alert the student that is to give them
more warnings before they actually make any mistakes. There is a great
suggestion from the book by Carroll (2002) that is ‘asking for drafts’[4].
Although this will increase the workload of the teachers, before punishing the
students, it is better to give them a chance or to teach them the appropriate
approach. It is good for the teachers to see what the students’ weaknesses are,
which parts need improvement or which part is actually committing plagiarism,
etc. In this way, students can truly learn from their mistakes. Also, I recently
find that many tutors will require the students to submit their written work to
the Chinese University Plagiarism IDentification Engine (CUPIDE). This is a
good measure for the teachers since they can easily identify any cases of
plagiarism. It can also alert the students before they make any mistakes or
attempt to make any mistakes. One thing to note is that clear guidelines should
be given to the students by the teachers beforehand, telling them what they
should do and they should not. Teachers must be fair to the students before the
students should subject to any kinds of punishment. And these could be some
possible short-term solutions to diminish the problem. As for long-term effect,
I think education is very important. There is an old saying, ‘prevention is
better than cure’. Before penalizing the students for their misbehaviors, it is
better to teach them the correct attitude, especially for the freshmen. Through
different activities and workshops, we can raise the students’ awareness concerning
plagiarism and educate them the importance of respecting the academic honesty,
for example teaching students what is plagiarism, what the different types of
plagiarism are, how to include others’ ideas in their work or how to use the
commonly used American Psychological Association (APA) format to cite references,
etc. Apart from directly teaching them about plagiarism, I think that teaching
them the correct attitude towards life is also very important. I think that as
university students, we should learn to be more mature. It is a critical moment
to learn to deal with stress and have a better management of ourselves so as to
be well-prepared for any future challenges what may face in the society.
Teachers need to take an active role to educate them, if they find that there
is something wrong with the students, they can provide some counseling to the
students, or help them to deal with the problem, e.g. if the students have some
difficulty in handing in the assignment punctually, then they can consider of
giving them a little bit more time, so that they can really finish their work
by themselves instead of considering the negative alternative ways of
fulfilling the requirements. The students should also be responsible; they
should think carefully whether they have the ability or the time to do what
they wish to do apart from their studies. Not only can they help themselves to
improve, they can also take an active role to help those newcomers. As senior
students, they can try to promote the correct attitude to the freshmen and warn
them the possible consequence of committing plagiarism once they enter the
university, for example having some sharing sessions during the department
orientation camps. In this way, it can help to prevent the problem, as it is
always easier for the students to understand and learn from each other rather
than through the teachers. Then, the situation will gradually improve day by
day. If students feel that their academic studies are quite challenging to them,
they can think about reducing their burden outside class or seek help and
support from the teachers, see if there is an alternative way of solving their
problem. Communication between the teachers and the students is always very
important. Education is to train people to successful people, not losers. If
possible, teachers can try to bring positive influence to the students, before
considering the last resort, punishment, because the most important thing is
that the students can really learn a lesson. I think these can lead to a truly
long-term effect.
I was once an offender of plagiarism,
and this was not a very happy experience. I remembered that I was very busy
engaging in different activities and working for my committee, and I found it
very hard to meet the deadline of my assignments. Even when I managed to squeeze
some time for my homework, I felt that the homework was quite challenging for
me. Then, I sought help from my friends. They were very nice and they sent me
their homework for my reference. At that time, we knew little about plagiarism.
Once I got my friends’ homework, I tried to adopt his ideas and copying part of
their work. They knew about it, but they thought that it was alright. After
handing in the homework, both of us were discovered by the professors and we
got a demerit each. I felt so sad. Not only did I receive the punishment, I
also put my friend into trouble. I was very sorry for that, because I felt that
I should be the one to bear all the responsibility, but my friends should not
be affected. However, after reading some books, surfing on some websites and
seeking advice from the professor, I understand that both of us have the
responsibility to prevent plagiarism. After all, I did not make any improvement
in my academic studies, since I did not go through the process of thinking and
presenting what I have learned in class, what I did was just copying. However,
I have learned a lesson; I will never ever do this again.
By law, most university students are
already adults. We should all be responsible for what we have done. We enter
university for improvement, for gaining knowledge and for preparing ourselves
for the future lives. We do not enter the universities for learning to cheat,
to copy or to deceive people. We must be aware of the fact that as a citizen,
we should obey the rules and bear social responsibilities. We should take the
lead to change and to improve instead of deteriorating the situation. If
everybody has the same idea in mind that plagiarism is a minor issue, and then
the world will become very dull and boring, there will be no new ideas and no
originality. There should be no excuse for any wrong doings, we should have
critical thinking and be sensible enough to make our own judgment. Anything
excuses like innocence are no longer acceptable. It is very important to know
what is right and what is wrong. It is ignorant to think that what you
have done will not be discovered by others. If you are directly copying others’
work, people can easily find that there are discrepancies in the writing styles;
sometimes the work may not be coherent as well. It is not difficult for the
teachers, especially the experienced ones to spot the problem. Also, as I have
mentioned before, there are many advanced technology which can help the
teachers to find out any suspected cases of plagiarism, such as the CUPIDE. Do
not be naïve. It is better to discipline yourself rather than relying on others
to discipline you which may in turns lead to undesirable consequence.
The university is a place to educate
the future pillars of the society, and it is the final gate before entering the
society. That is why it is crucial to teach them the correct attitude towards
life. Plagiarism may not seem to be a serious offense to university students,
but as highly educated people, they should respect others’ hard work. In this
way they can truly be a mature person. And, the success will depend on the
cooperation between the students and the teachers. I hope that this passage can
truly help students understand plagiarism, hence reduce their chance of
offending plagiarism.
Reference:
1.Plagiarism.
In Oxford
English Dictionary Online. Retrieved 5 September, 2008, from http://dictionary.oed.com/
[3] R. A. Harris (2001). The
Plagiarism Handbook: Strategies for Preventing, Detecting, and Dealing with
Plagiarism.Los Angeles, CA: Pyrczak Publishing.
[4] J.
Carroll (2002). A Handbook for deterring
Plagiarism in Higher Education. Oxford: Oxford Centre for Staff
and Learning Development.
