UA takes on student plagiarism

Changes put focus on monitoring of academic integrity

A new eight-week course will be required for some students found guilty of plagiarism at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, the latest effort in a revamped approach to tackle academic dishonesty.

UA reviewed 192 plagiarism cases in the 2012-13 school year, the most recent statistics available. Plagiarism made up the largest category of 418 academic integrity cases, said Monica Holland, executive director of UA's Academic Initiatives and Integrity Department. Of that total, 254 cases were sustained, Holland said.

Along with the new course, the university for almost four years has given students access to an anti-plagiarism computer program also used by instructors. It's a way to help students understand how seriously plagiarism is treated in academia, said Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Sharon Gaber.

"It's sort of catching those students who might not have an understanding about the way it works, giving them an opportunity to see that it's potentially a problem," Gaber said.

The UA also revamped academic integrity policies for the 2011-12 school year, with integrity cases more than doubling after the change. But Holland said the new policy also affected the reporting structure of incidents, so that the 2011-12 incident reporting year included two extra months.

While it's unclear if plagiarism is increasing, more instructors now address the problem directly with students, said Dorothy Stephens, chairman of UA's English Department.

"One thing that I do is to include in my syllabus or in each essay assignment a long -- and I'm talking a couple of pages -- explanation of what plagiarism is," Stephens said, calling it a "pretty big" problem in lower-level classes.

The policy revamp standardized penalties and established "academic integrity monitors" within a college or school to review dishonesty cases, with student-contested cases going before a board made up of faculty, staff and students.

Penalties vary, with sanctions assigned points that add up over a student's academic career. Only two students were suspended in 2012-13 based on their academic integrity record, Holland said.

The most common penalties for students result from a "level one" violation -- resulting in a zero grade on an assignment -- or a "level zero" violation, when suspected plagiarism or unauthorized collaboration is a first offense making up less than 10 percent of an assignment. The "level zero" policy, established for the most recent academic year, results in a letter of reprimand but no grade sanction.

Most often, students have thought about plagiarism only in limited terms, Stephens said.

She said she discusses the importance of research to academics in explaining plagiarism to students who might be tempted to copy without properly citing their sources.

"Academic publications don't usually bring people a lot of money, but our reputations are extremely important. What we have said -- the fact that it belongs to us -- is hugely important," Stephens said.

Buying a paper online or having someone else do coursework is a betrayal of other students, Stephens said she tells her classes.

Computer program

For about five years, UA has made use of a computer program called SafeAssign that compares submitted papers to other papers submitted at UA, as well as with information on the Internet and in various databases. It checks how much text from one paper matches any other text in the database, requiring instructors to review whether material is cited properly.

Faculty members choose whether to use the program.

"SafeAssign works pretty darn well," Stephens said.

She added that she uses it in her undergraduate courses and tells students their work will be checked by the program.

"I take no pleasure in finding a cheater. I'd much rather set it up so a student realizes in the beginning it makes no sense to try," Stephens said.

She said she doesn't advise students to use the tool on their own.

"I don't want to encourage students to think, 'Well, I can log in to see whether the system's going to catch my plagiarism,'" Stephens said.

She said she didn't know UA had set up the program so students may use it without an instructor's approval.

Data kept by UA shows that students don't necessarily even take advantage of this option. The program is built into the learning technology system known as Blackboard, so it doesn't cost the university extra to use it, said Chris Bray, UA's Blackboard administrator.

He said representatives from UA's Associated Student Government requested access to the tool.

"Some of the graduate students in the ASG wanted to be able to search their theses and dissertations and things like that. It was opened up to them and really anybody else in the system," Bray said.

Since October 2010, only about 3,800 assignment have been submitted by students using the program on their own, Bray said -- a tiny fraction of the 175,000 assignments submitted to SafeAssign over the past four years.

"I don't think all the students realize that that tool is available to them," said Terry Martin, vice provost for academic affairs, adding that the university wants more students to know they have access to it.

Others Take Stand

The UA isn't alone in encouraging students to submit drafts to such a program. The University of Florida allows similar access to anti-plagiarism software, according to a spokesman.

Other schools, like the University of Tennessee and the University of Missouri, leave it up to the instructor to allow students to submit drafts.

Jim Spain, vice provost for undergraduate studies at the University of Missouri, wrote in an email that "we encourage faculty to use SafeAssign as a teaching tool, helping students learn through use of the platform."

Apart from writing, computer code and even architecture documents have been plagiarized in the past, Holland said.

Susan Gauch, head of UA's Computer Science & Computer Engineering Department, said instructors also use a computer program to check for similarities between computer code written by students.

For a few years before the policy revamp, the UA held workshops for those found guilty of plagiarism.

"We realized that the content needed to be covered was best suited for an extended period of time as opposed to a half-day session," Holland said.

NW News on 07/14/2014

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