The young woman sat across from my desk, her eyes
brimming with tears, pleading:
"This can't be happening to me.
I'm not that kind of a student.
I can't tell my parents. What will they think of
me?
You've got to give me another chance.
Please!"
The student had been found guilty of academic misconduct. She had plagiarized a paper. She was appealing to me to change my decision that she be given an unexpungable "F" for a course and be suspended for two semesters from FlU. I did not alter her punishment. In addition, as a result of the suspension, she lost her academic scholarship.
As a former Vice Provost for Academic Affairs, it was my unhappy duty each semester to hear cases of academic dishonesty and to review the sanctions recommended by the University Academic Conduct Review Board and to impose punishment. (Academic dishonesty, along with its possible "disciplinary penalties," is defined in the Student Handbook and includes such acts as cheating, bribery, falsification of records and plagiarism.) This summer was particularly difficult because one professor made a shocking discovery: 13 students in one of his Spring Semester (1991) courses had plagiarized from 12 students that had taken the same course last Fall (1990). Thus, we were faced with charging not only the students who "received" the papers but the students who "furnished" the papers.
While there are some obvious complexities of meaning and a few situations where what constitutes the act may be a bit vague the core meaning is clear: Plagiarism is "taking over the ideas, methods, or written words of another, without acknowledgment and with the intention that they be taken as the work of the deceiver ("Statement on Plagiarism," Academe [September/October 1989]: 47). A handout from FIU's English Department says bluntly: "Plagiarism is the presenting of the work of another as if it were your own. It is a grave academic offense and can be punished by dismissal from the university." This handout distinguished between "intentional" and "unintentional" plagiarism; the latter "occurs when the writer is unaware of the need for, or the rules of, documentation. It is a the student's responsibility to understand these rules; plagiarism is no less serious an offence because it is unintentional."
In the case mentioned above, questions for a take-home final examination in both the Fall and Spring semesters were virtually identical. Some students from the Fall course provided copies of their rough drafts or finished examinations papers to the Spring semester students. Some of the receivers simply took off the cover page and wrote their own name and section and turned in the paper as their work; others borrowed liberally from the other student's paper and failed to acknowledge the source. For the receivers, it was not a question of intention; almost all the students admitted their guilt. Not surprisingly, most of the "donors" -- those who had provided the papers -- denied that they had intentionally provided a paper which they knew would be plagiarized. Since intention was difficult to prove, most of the "donors" were given a stern reprimands and a warning. Those who received and submitted another student's work as their own were suspended from the University. (Had this been a student's second offense, he or she would have most likely been permanently expelled, not only from FIU but from all of the nine state universities.)
What was surprising -- and disturbing -- was that this academic dishonesty was not confined to a particular kind of student. Male/female, upper/lower division, weak students/students with GPAs of 3.5 or better, scholars/athletes -- all were represented among the receivers. Unfortunately, academic dishonesty seems not only to be widespread but an equal opportunity employer. Moreover, many of the student, event those who admitted their guilt, did not seem to grasp what all the fuss was about.
The fuss is about honesty and integrity. In academia plagiarism is taken very seriously. For an administrator or a faculty member, being found guilty of plagiarism can cost one a position. For example, recently Dr. H. Joachim Maitre, Dean of Boston University's College of Communication, resigned as Dean because he had been accused of plagiarism; in a commencement address, he used the words of another person without acknowledgement. Convicted of plagiarism, a scholar may (and often does) lose his or her job; at the very least such a stain on one's reputation will last a lifetime. The same holds true in almost all professional fields. In journalism, Newsweek's media critic, Jonathan Alter, describes plagiarism as a "a 'career killer'" (quoted in USA Today, 25 July 1991, 1bff). Plagiarism strikes at the very heart of the educational process; it subverts and corrupts thinking and learning. That is why the faculty hold themselves to the same standard to which they hold students.
Plagiarism jeopardizes one's reputation and academic standing. Take the advice of the English Department's handout: "If you have any doubts about the way you have handled your source material in your paper, discuss your problems with your instructor before handing in the paper."
Charles Ekins is in his first semester as a professor in the department of English after serving as Vice Provost for Academic Affairs. Last year, Elkins was forced to suspend 13 students for committing plagiarism.
From The Beacon, (student newspaper at FIU) 9/4/91 p.15