Over the Last Few Decades, Technology Has Revolutionized the Way That People Send and Receive

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INTERNET PLAGIARISM

The Growing Trend of Internet Plagiarism: New Cause

for Concern in Canadian Schools

Jillian L.O. Bussiere

Introduction

Over the last few decades, technology has revolutionized the way people send and receive information. Laptops have become more commonplace than home computers, e-mail has replaced letter writing, and text messaging has enabled people to make instant contact anywhere in the world. These rapid changes in technology have created a sense of urgency that today’s youth must not only learn how to use technology, they must learn how to use it effectively. Whose responsibility is it to ensure this happens? If you ask many of today’s educators, it appears that the job has been given to them by default. This is a huge task, one that many educators do not feel equipped to handle, especially given the fact that technology is always changing. What makes this task even more arduous is that as this technological revolution continues, teachers are noticing that more and more students are becoming adept at using technology to take shortcuts when completing their assignments rather than relying on their own creativity. This has lead to an increase in the occurrence of Internet plagiarism in many classrooms across this country and around the world. While plagiarism is something educators have seen before, Internet plagiarism has given them new cause for concern given its scope and its implications for teaching.

Although we know it is a problem, finding a way to address Internet plagiarism appears to be more difficult than we originally thought. Instead of feeling like we have the answers, we are faced with a whole new set of questions that need to be answered if we are going to teach this new generation of young people to be “responsible stewards of information.” Some of these questions include: Why do students plagiarize? Who is to blame for its widespread growth in learning communities throughout Canada and around the world? Are plagiarism detection programs necessary in order to reduce the amount of plagiarism that occurs in schools, or is there a better solution? Finally, as teacher-librarians, what can we do to equip students and teachers with the tools they need to address the growing problem of plagiarism in schools? In order to provide a solution for the problem, we need to have all of the background information!

Background Information

Before we can address the problem of Internet plagiarism, we need to know why it exists in the first place. This can only be accomplished when we thoroughly examine the existing research and begin to draw our own conclusions. When we do this, we discover that students plagiarize for a variety of reasons: Some students are so busy trying to do everything else, that they leave their assignments until the last minute and in a rush to get it done, choose to submit someone else’s work rather than their own (Whiteman & Gordon, 2001). Others purchase assignments from the Internet or use chunks of text from various sources because they want to get good marks (Hamilton, 2003). Another group of students who plagiarize do not even know that they are doing it because they have never been taught what it is, or how to properly cite Internet documents (Snodgrass & Bevevino, 2005). A final group of students plagiarize because it’s easy and they think they can get away with it (Renard, 2000). In her article entitled Plagiarism: Librarians Help Provide New Solutions to an Old Problem, Denise Hamilton (2003) provides further insight into the problem:

Some students just don’t care. They claim they are too short on time, or that the assignment is “bogus,”or the course isn’t within their major and so it doesn’t matter anyway. Some overachievers fear that what they write themselves won’t be good enough, and then there is the contingent of students who are just plain lazy. There are also honest students whose plagiarism is unintentional, because they do not fully understand how to summarize, paraphrase, and make correct bibliographic citations. (p. 26)

This realization is frustrating for today’s educators who are already skeptical about the role that technology plays in education and disheartened by the fact that Internet plagiarism appears to be on an incline rather than a decline. Hamilton offers some comfort when she notes that, “Technology has made plagiarism easier, but it has also made it easier to detect” (p. 26).

In a similar article called Cut and Paste 101: Plagiarism and the Net, Lisa Renard (2000) puts all Internet cheaters into one of three categories: the unintentional cheaters, the sneaky cheaters, and the all-or-nothing cheaters. According to Renard, the unintentional cheaters are those students who don’t know they are cheating because they have never been taught how to cite Internet sources or how to put text into their own words. The sneaky cheaters understand that what they are doing is plagiarizing, but they do it anyway because they rarely get caught. Finally, the all-or-nothing cheaters are Renard’s version of students who put off doing the work and end up running out of time. While both Renard and Hamilton recognize that students who plagiarize do it for very different reasons, they also acknowledge that this doesn’t make it right. If we are going to minimize plagiarism in our classrooms, then students need to be shown that there are alternatives to cheating. Rather than contributing to the problem by pretending it doesn’t exist, we need to help find a solution.

Who’s to Blame?

Doug Johnson not only believes that educators need to help find a solution, he believes we are part of the problem. In his article The Other Side of Plagiarism, Johnson (2004) contends that students cheat because the assignments that we give them make it too easy for them to do so. He maintains that, “As educators, it is our ethical failing if our assignments do not help students learn necessary academic and life-long skills. Research assignments that only reach Bloom’s Taxonomy levels of Knowledge and Comprehension do neither” (p. 98). In other words, Johnson believes that students plagiarize because assignments do not challenge them to use higher level thinking skills, critically analyze texts, or develop their own hypotheses and conclusions. If students are only required to “regurgitate” information that they have read on the Internet, then why would they make the effort to put it into their own words? Of course one can argue that regardless of assignment design, students still have the choice whether to plagiarize or not, but to what degree does this responsibility lie with educators?

Based on evidence from other studies, I would have to agree with Johnson’s claim that teachers are partially to blame for Internet plagiarism. Like Johnson, these educators believe that if teachers continue to give assignments that only require students to use existing information, they will be more and more likely to hand in assignments that have been “borrowed” from online sources (Drogemuller, 1997; Rocklin, 2000; Whiteman & Gordon, 2001). In her article, Pushing Against Plagiarism Through Creative Assignments, Kate Cummings (2003) points out that, “We as educators need to take a look at what we do to contribute to this situation. Can we restructure our assignments to make plagiarism less effective? Are we willing to make the effort?” (p. 22). Instead of complaining about the problem, Cummings encourages us to do something about it and suggests that a good place to start would be to change our assignments. We can do this by using WebQuests, giving students choice, or using inquiry-based projects to direct students’ learning. These types of projects lend themselves more to original work, than assignments that simply ask students to recite facts. Cummings states:

We need to help our students become comfortable being creative. We need to encourage them to digest information and to reformulate it by giving them a venue that requires them to present information in a new light or with a unique twist. This approach may mean more work for the educator, but I believe that one of the best solutions to the problem of plagiarism lies in the assignment. (p. 23)

If we believe what Cummings is saying, then we are going to have to put the time and effort into making our assignments creative. If we do not assign tasks that are relevant to students and that encourage them to contribute to their own learning, then we cannot be surprised when students hand in work that is plagiarized. Instead of being part of the problem, we need to be part of the solution!

Being part of the solution means more than just redesigning assignments. It also means teaching kids what plagiarism is and how to avoid it (McCullen, 2003). It means showing them how to cite Internet documents and holding them accountable for it (Drogemuller, 1997). Being part of the solution means walking students through the research process and expecting them to hand in rough drafts at each stage of the project (Renard, 2000). It means showing students how to summarize, paraphrase, and take proper jot notes (Snodgrass & Bevevino, 2005). Most importantly, being part of the solution means having clear expectations for students’ work and firm consequences when these expectations are not met (Bugeja, 2004). In his article Designing Cyber-Assignments, Richard Drogemuller (1997) gives us a set of guidelines to follow when designing assignments for students:

• Make the assignments interesting and relevant to students.
• Involve the parents in the research process.

• Make sure students hand in at least one rough draft.
• Teach students how to reference and give credit to their sources and then allow them to practice this skill.
• Make students hand in an original copy of one item that is on their reference list.

Drogemuller believes that in order to eliminate plagiarism in our classrooms, students need to be taught what good research practice looks like. They need to be guided through the process and then held accountable for each stage of their learning. When we do this, we encourage good work habits and put the onus back on our students to produce work that is both creative and original. Ultimately, we want them to take responsibility for the work they produce and the decisions they make!

Based on what we are currently seeing in our classrooms, not all of our students are taking this responsibility seriously. In classrooms throughout Canada, students are still submitting work that has been copied from other sources. If we truly believe that educators should be held responsible for their part in the problem, then it only makes sense that we hold students accountable too. Research shows that most students who plagiarize are not making a conscious choice to cheat (Snodgrass & Bevevino, 2005). For these students, the solution is really quite simple: They need to be taught what plagiarism is and how to avoid it. What about students who plagiarize even though they know it is wrong? For these students, the issue becomes one of morals and ethics, something that they seem to be lacking. In an article entitled The Price of an A: An Educator’s Responsibility to Academic Honesty, Sherri Whiteman (2001) claims:

Students will always be stressed and over-scheduled. Capitalists will always tempt students to spend their parent’s cash in order to slack off. Teachers will always assign papers that are less than perfect than they could be. But isn’t the key of the matter the integrity of our students rather than our ability to entertain them? Our students must learn that cheating is wrong, not only because there is a distinct possibility of getting caught, but also because they have a moral responsibility. (p. 30)

When we teach our students what plagiarism is and show them how to properly document Internet resources, we are satisfying our responsibility to teach them these morals. When we show them how to paraphrase and give credit to the original source, we are giving them the tools they need to make ethical decisions. Once we have done our part, the rest is up to them!

Plagiarism Detection Programs

Although “the rest may be up to them,” educators can still take some precautions to guard against plagiarism in their schools. One of these precautions is to use a plagiarism detection program like Turnitin.com. This type of software enables educators to copy student papers into the Turnitin.com database to see if any or all of the paper has been plagiarized. Although the program is both useful and effective, I have to wonder if it is worth the thousands of dollars that school divisions are spending on it. Isn’t there a more cost-efficient way to check students’ assignments that is equally as effective? According to Lisa Renard (2000) in her article Cut and Paste 101: Plagiarism and the Net, there are many ways that we can check to see if students’ assignments have been plagiarized that do not incur any costs at all, other than our time:

• Searching the Internet using key words or phrases from students’ papers.
• Checking students’ reference pages.
• Asking students questions about their papers and “terms” used within their papers.
• Obtaining a sample of all students’ writing at the beginning of the semester so that there is something to compare it to.

Instead of paying thousands of dollars for a plagiarism detection program like Turnitin.com, we can teach our students to be accountable for the information they use from the Internet and how they use it. If students know that we will be checking their reference lists and asking them questions about their papers, they will be less likely to cheat and more likely to produce original work.

Teacher-librarians Role

While it is important to hold students accountable for the information they use and how they use it, it is equally important to hold teachers accountable for teaching these skills. Before we can do this, we must ask ourselves the following questions: Can we expect teachers to demonstrate these skills if they have never been taught them? If we expect teachers to redesign assignments or check papers for phrases that have been plagiarized, but don’t teach them how to do it, is it realistic to expect them to develop these skills on their own? If we haven’t shown teachers how to detect, avoid, and teach students about plagiarism, then can we be surprised when the problem is getting worse instead of better? The answer to all of these questions is of course, NO! We can’t assume that teachers have these skills just because they are teachers. Instead, we must provide teachers with the same learning opportunities that we would give our students. In her article Plagiarism: Librarians Help Provide New Solutions to an Old Problem, Denise Hamilton (2003) tells us that the most logical person to provide this instruction is the one trained as an information specialist, the teacher-librarian. Hamilton believes that teacher-librarians can guide educators through the learning process by providing links to sites on referencing, teaching mini-lessons about plagiarism, and even creating Web pages for students and teachers that deal with these topics. Hamilton believes that, “Plagiarism will not disappear, nor will the problems associated with detecting it. Librarians can help by sharing their expertise with both students and educators” (p. 28). The reality is, that if we want teachers to be part of the solution, then we need to teach them how!

Teachers must also be taught how to use “authentic assignments” to guide student learning. This is another skill that we can’t just expect teachers to learn without giving them examples and offering them our support. Nor can we assume that just because they aren’t doing it, means they don’t want to. The reality is, that there are many teachers who want to learn how to design assignments that are authentic, that go beyond requiring students to simply reproduce facts, but no one has ever shown them how. Whose responsibility is this? I believe that this responsibility lies with teacher-librarians. First, we need to show teachers how to reformulate their ideas and reshape their research topics in order to encourage students to use higher level thinking skills. Then we must teach students “how to use available research materials to create and support an original idea” (Minkel, 2002, p. 51). Teacher-librarians are in a good position to be able to provide assistance in both of these areas by collaborating with teachers on their assignments and working with students to develop good research skills. Annette Lamb (2004) shows us what this collaboration looks like in her article WebQuests, stressing the importance of involving teacher-librarians in the research process:

Library media specialists play an important role in the use of WebQuests by making certain that Web-based materials are carefully selected to support information needs. In addition, they often collaborate with teachers in promoting student knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to become effective users of information. (p. 39)

When we collaborate with teachers on authentic assignments, we not only provide opportunities for students to think critically, creatively, and independently, we show them what good research skills look like!