I spent last week grading assignments. In one course my task included a choice of content and questions. I was almost at the end of the forty-plus papers when I encountered one different in structure. I was annoyed to see that the student hadn’t followed my instructions. ‘Why didn’t he read the instructions; they were crystal clear? What didn’t he understand?’ I asked myself while reading. I decided to ignore the structure of the paper initially and to concentrate on the content. As I read, I could sense that the student hadn’t written the piece. Even though the course was a-synchronous with little inter-personal communication, I could feel something suspicious about the text. As I fed phrases and sentences into Google, I recognised the three websites from which the student had copied the text word-for-word. Yes, this was plagiarism; yes, it happened to me.
Hit by an emotional wave of shock, disappointment, embarrassment, and anger, I got up and left my computer. In the following hours and days, my head was buzzing with questions. I want to share some of those concerns with you here. I begin with questions I’ve been pondering about the student, my course, and plagiarism in general, and conclude with more complex issues, those concerning my reaction to the incident, and my identity as a relational teacher-educator.
- Why did that student feel the need to copy his assignment from essay-help websites?
- Why was the assignment so challenging for this particular student?
- How long did the student struggle with the task’s requirements before turning for help in a dishonest way?
- Why didn’t the student come to me for help when I offered it repeatedly in various media throughout the course?
- Why didn’t this student (who attended several of my informal meetings on Zoom) raise the difficulty he was facing?
- Did the student tell anyone in the cohort about their difficulty or the ‘writing assistance’ they received?
- Would this have happened with this particular student in a face-to-face course?
- Did the student think I would recognise that the work wasn’t his?
- Was the student aware that his practice was dishonest and forbidden?
- Was the email I sent to the student, cc’ing the department head, with a warning and an offer to repeat the assignment too soft? If the answer I received didn’t reflect a full understanding of the severity of the situation, maybe it was.
- How many other cases went unnoticed?
- How can I rework the assignment to avoid this in the future?
- How might I insert a reminder about academic integrity into each assignment I give?
- How might I offer assistance more encouragingly?
- How can we explain plagiarism to our students – clearer and much earlier in their studies?
- What do I need to say to my students about plagiarism, beyond the sessions they receive from the faculty?
- Should I regard this incident as more severe because the student has already completed an undergraduate degree?
- Is it reasonable that I expect teacher candidates to show more academic integrity than other students?
- Is there a scale of seriousness relating to plagiarism? Is buying a paper more serious than copying from the web and not referencing?
- Why does it particularly bother me that he copied the information from an essay-help website? Is that any different from copying from other sources?
- Has my student learnt his lesson?
- What implications does this behaviour have for the student’s future as a teacher?
- What is required of my student and me when we meet in other courses in the future?
- Why do I see this as a failure of mine as a teacher educator?
- Why do I feel partly responsible for not designing my assignment so that it required more originality?
- What does this single case of dishonesty say about the relationship I have (or maybe don’t have) with my students?
- How do I understand my reaction to this case of cheating?
- Why did I take this personally?
- Why was the central emotion I experienced disappointment, and even a sense of disillusionment?
- Is the trust between teacher educator and students which I strive for realistic?
