What are we supposed to do as a Writing Colleague if we think that a student has plagerised on a paper? How do you approach the question? Even if it is unintential. It is possible that a student could even write a paper that is written with too much of an author's perspective and not enough of their own account of the analysis.
I imagine that if a student is dilligent enough to come into the Writing Center he or she is unlikely to have completely plagerised a paper. Who knows though--maybe they are taking it to us to see if it could pass as their own. this could be such a touchy subject to bring up. How do ask the question? "Uhm.. are you sure that you wrote this paper?" Awkward. I guess you would just have to suggest that they do more citing. Maybe propose "this sounds a lot like the author speaking. Maybe you should cite this?" I'm sure this happens from time to time. I'll be sure to ask the girl I shadow about it.
Speaking of the girl that I shadow... I went to shadow her last week and the girl that had signed up to meet with her cancelled her appointment. Although the appointment was cancellled I used that time to talk to her about her experience as a consultant. She said that the hardest thing about being a consultant is not knowing if you really helped someone or not. For instance, she said that the student she helped before I came in wrote a paper on a topic that was foreign to her. It has to do with economics and trade. She has never studied that before and so she has a hard time trying to make sure that his paper was cohesive when really that whole thing was foreign to her. She did note that he was clear on what he needed help with so that ultimately gave her some guidance. She still left the meeting unsure of whether or not she helped him though. i guess it's the type of thing where you just have to do your best! Hopefully this week she will have an appointment!
The idea of "accidentally" plagiarizing and how a writing consultant would handle such a situation is definitely worth thinking about. For instance today when I shadowed in the writing center, the consultant was helping out with an ESL student. At one part, in response to the consultant's recommendation to add his opinion in a paragraph, the writer said that he couldn't add his own opinion, because it is a formal academic paper. He thought this meant he was supposed to use solely the work and in some cases the words, of others. Clearly in this case the plagiarism he committed was one out of misunderstanding, and so the consultant handled it by explaining the purpose of an essay to back up your own opinions with evidence.
ReplyDeleteIn a situation where an act of plagiarism is not quite so innocent, how a consultant should go about handling it is a tricky question. I guess like so many other things, this is not a black and white issue; rather each case must be taken into consideration separately.