Plagiarism Chronicles (redux!)

[Parasaurolophus]

Originally started on the CHE Forum by t_r_b, I hereby reinstate the plagiarism chronicles!

I've scanned recent threads and haven't found any devoted to the general discussion of plagiarism cases. I hereby declare this thread open for that purpose. 

Plagiarism-related questions, comments, strategies, gripes... they're all welcome here.


For my part, I've just caught my first plagiarists in a long while. They had to write a summary of an article I provided (which we'll eventually workshop up into a full paper), and one of these two took his friend's paper, opened up a thesaurus, and went at it. Happily for me, they handed their papers in together, which made spotting it very easy. Unhappily for them, the prose is barely legible, and the summary is about an article we talked about in class, not the one I assigned. So even if they hadn't plagiarized, it'd still be a failing grade.

I haven't had one of these office conversations in a while, so I'm pretty rusty and not looking forward to it. I've highlighted the plagiarized passages in different colours (but corresponding to the same passage in the other paper, to make it easy to see what's copied from what). I'm halfway tempted to just straight-up ask why they handed in the same paper, although I know that's not really the best way to do it. Sigh.

[LetsGetCooking]

I recently had a tidal wave of plagiarism that I recognized right away, but the plagiarism checker did not find any matches. Why? Because the students had used a thesaurus to change just about every word in the document. (In fact, I think it is highly likely that they ran the original source through some sort of online tool or program to get the effect because even the title of the book was changed!)

It. Was. Hilarious!

I have not laughed that much reading students' papers in a long time. The sentences made no sense! The paper's would have failed on being incomprehensible, but it was clear that something more than just extremely bad writing.

It is called "Rogeting"
https://www.theguardian.com/education/shortcuts/2014/aug/08/rogeting-sinister-buttocks-students-essays-plagiarising-thesaurus

Since the plagiarism checker didn't find the originals I had to do it myself. I found some words where I could easily decipher the original words, which pointed to unique phrases or clear concepts from the source. Then, I googled to find them. Luckily, the students were not very creative in choosing source material (stuff like Wikipedia), so I was able to find matches with some digging. It took time, but was worth it to be able to document the plagiarism.

All laughing aside, it is troublesome that the plagiarism checker came up with 0% matches when the documents were 100% matches with a thesaurus. It is sad to think that students try so hard to cheat and that the ones I catch are the ones that fail at cheating.

It is also disturbing to think that I might have missed this plagiarism if the program or tool had done a better job at changing the sentences. How much plagiarism/cheating do I miss? I used to think I was good at catching cheating, but it is disheartening to think that students, and especially the online tools available for them to use, are becoming more sophisticated while the plagiarism checkers need to be updated to catch them better.

[mamselle]

The upside might be, at least now they've heard of a thesaurus, and don't think it's an ancient reptile anymore....

M.

[0susanna]

Originally started on the CHE Forum by t_r_b, I hereby reinstate the plagiarism chronicles!

I've scanned recent threads and haven't found any devoted to the general discussion of plagiarism cases. I hereby declare this thread open for that purpose. 

Plagiarism-related questions, comments, strategies, gripes... they're all welcome here.


For my part, I've just caught my first plagiarists in a long while. They had to write a summary of an article I provided (which we'll eventually workshop up into a full paper), and one of these two took his friend's paper, opened up a thesaurus, and went at it. Happily for me, they handed their papers in together, which made spotting it very easy. Unhappily for them, the prose is barely legible, and the summary is about an article we talked about in class, not the one I assigned. So even if they hadn't plagiarized, it'd still be a failing grade.

I haven't had one of these office conversations in a while, so I'm pretty rusty and not looking forward to it. I've highlighted the plagiarized passages in different colours (but corresponding to the same passage in the other paper, to make it easy to see what's copied from what). I'm halfway tempted to just straight-up ask why they handed in the same paper, although I know that's not really the best way to do it. Sigh.

I find that starting out with a seemingly innocuous question works well--something like, "Tell me about your process..." or "Can you tell me the main point of [title of the assigned paper]?" That usually exposes the problems pretty quickly.

[Hegemony]

Arrrrrgh, my first clear plagiarism case in ages.  And from a student who came in to my office hours several times looking for help on other assignments!  But for this one, he obviously got his "help" from the internet.  The first two lines had three complex technical terms that would be surprising for any undergraduate to know.  Sure enough, the first paragraph is verbatim out of Wikipedia.  The rest of the assignment was too specific for anyone to find online, so it's clear he had to write that himself — and the level of vocabulary reverts to undergraduate.  So he didn't even need that first paragraph!  And he was a sweet and cooperative kid.  However, my syllabus promises that I will prosecute plagiarism, and I will.  And proescuting involves him failing the course, as is very clear on my syllabus.  Argh, student, what were you thinking!

Our university regulations mandate that I call him in and have a talk with him.  I really don't want to do this, and the idea of the talk is that the student might be induced to confess, or to demonstrate that they didn't actually plagiarize.  But this case is so clear-cut, it seems silly to call him in.  One thing I hate about plagiarism, apart from the low-down sneakiness of it, is the hassle.

[AvidReader]

Ugh indeed! Good luck. I imagine he will either be duly horrified or try the "Oh! Those are my notes!" excuse.

The thread on throwing out old papers is reminding me of a technique for teaching plagiarism that I've tried recently with some success. (So sorry if I posted this on the old CHE--I've really been excited about it).

I've always considered myself meticulous about citations in my own work, but when I was defending my dissertation, the examiners pointed out a paragraph that summarized an essential book on the topic. I attributed the book in the opening sentence, but didn't clearly indicate that the book provided all the information in the paragraph. (Based on their feedback, I revised the paragraph to include clearer attributions before submission).

This year, when we talked about the importance of attributing sources in every sentence, I pulled up the original paragraph and asked them to tell me which ideas I'd gotten from the book's author, and which were based on my own reading. I got them to tell me why it was hard to be sure, and we discussed why someone who wrote a whole book on the subject deserved to be cited for every separate fact or idea. Then I showed them the revised paragraph, and we talked about how easy it had been to make the changes. (Then they all paraphrased paragraphs of their own for me).

AR.

[polly_mer]

The thread on throwing out old papers is reminding me of a technique for teaching plagiarism that I've tried recently with some success. (So sorry if I posted this on the old CHE--I've really been excited about it).

This technique is so good that I've quoted you on Jedi Mind Tricks because everyone should get to see it.  Thanks for sharing!

[Hegemony]

My plagiarist declares he is incensed that I would accuse him of such a thing, because he is not, never has been, and never will be a plagiarist.  Fortunately the Wikipedia entry is duplicated on other sites, so he can't even claim he wrote the Wikipedia entry.  I am just dumbfounded that he thinks he can get away with claiming his plagiarism isn't plagiarism.  It reminds me of this very fine routine when the Smothers Brothers were on Craig Ferguson and Tommy claimed he was a pilot --

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEiU-8gx0hc

(If you're in a hurry, start at 2:40 and go till 6:07.)

[Morris Zapp]

Originally started on the CHE Forum by t_r_b, I hereby reinstate the plagiarism chronicles!

I've scanned recent threads and haven't found any devoted to the general discussion of plagiarism cases. I hereby declare this thread open for that purpose. 

Plagiarism-related questions, comments, strategies, gripes... they're all welcome here.


For my part, I've just caught my first plagiarists in a long while. They had to write a summary of an article I provided (which we'll eventually workshop up into a full paper), and one of these two took his friend's paper, opened up a thesaurus, and went at it. Happily for me, they handed their papers in together, which made spotting it very easy. Unhappily for them, the prose is barely legible, and the summary is about an article we talked about in class, not the one I assigned. So even if they hadn't plagiarized, it'd still be a failing grade.

I haven't had one of these office conversations in a while, so I'm pretty rusty and not looking forward to it. I've highlighted the plagiarized passages in different colours (but corresponding to the same passage in the other paper, to make it easy to see what's copied from what). I'm halfway tempted to just straight-up ask why they handed in the same paper, although I know that's not really the best way to do it. Sigh.

I find that starting out with a seemingly innocuous question works well--something like, "Tell me about your process..." or "Can you tell me the main point of [title of the assigned paper]?" That usually exposes the problems pretty quickly.

I was accused of 'bullying' a student when I called him up and asked to discuss the paper that he had handed in which contained extensive, extremely high level subject matter and ideas from a related, parallel field to the one in which the course was being taught (think an econ paper about poverty which is based entirely on sociology sources).  He was unable to say anything comprehensible about the paper which I'm fairly sure he bought or contracted for online.  But apparently you're not allowed to 'bully' the customers, so he's off to buy another paper in all likelihood.

[mamselle]

Outrage on the part of the guilty is so boring.

M.

[Juvenal]

Outrage on the part of the guilty is so boring.

M.

But it can be so interesting!

[Parasaurolophus]

Ugh. I allowed everyone who got below 50% to rewrite their summaries so that they could get up to a D. Two students proceeded to submit the same paper, poorly thesaurusized, just like my original pair. And it's still not even on one of the assigned topics.

Argh!

[AvidReader]

This technique is so good that I've quoted you on Jedi Mind Tricks because everyone should get to see it.  Thanks for sharing!

Aw, shucks! Thanks!

AR.

[citrine]

I am (still) chair of the board at my school which deals with plagiarism and other academic integrity issues, and if I had a nickel for every righteous indignation-based demand for an appeal that came into my inbox, my retirement account would be quite flush right now...

[Hegemony]

So I met with Stu Plagiarist.  He said that copying stuff verbatim was okay because he wasn't copying arguments, just facts.  So, according to him, it's legit to copy:

"Jane Austen was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots often explore the dependence of women on marriage in the pursuit of favourable social standing and economic security. Her works critique the novels of sensibility of the second half of the 18th century and are part of the transition to 19th-century literary realism."

(As per Wikipedia.) Because that's all facts and not argument.  I said, No it isn't okay.  He said that he had done this all through high school and college and no one said it was plagiarism.  I said that's because they must not have realized he copied it, because every one of them would have agreed it was plagiarism.  He looked genuinely baffled.  I believe that he did this all through high school and college and no one said it was plagiarism.  So, I guess he learned something today.