Plagiarism by International Students at University

Greetings from the Australian National Unviersity, where

Jude Carroll, of Oxford Brookes University UK, is speaking on "Exploring ten years’ experience of deterring plagiarism". She is the author of A Handbook for Deterring Plagiarism in Higher Education (OCSLD, 2011). Jude began by emphasizing that she was not claiming international students plagiarized more, but that they needed to have the academic process explained to them. She uses the word "deterrence" as the objective is to shape the student's decision making.:

Some points from the talk:

1. Not all Plagiarism is cheating: Jude emphasized that plagiarism is about work, not words. The majority of students do not understand what plagiarism is.
2. Australia leads the world on systematic approach to plagiarism: Australian institutions have a good systematic approach to dealing with plagiarism, not just using some detection software.
3. Plagiarism policies are important: Having a credible policy help prevent plagiarism.

Jude the discussed the differences of "international" students. One point that students from some educational backgrounds have not had to do written assignments. The solution was to explain what was needed with assignments and make the explanations are clear. Otherwise students do not there are rules, do not understand them and do not realize they apply to them.

Jude suggested that formal citations were not needed in all student work and students should not be penalized for early mistakes. For my ICT Sustainability students, I have then formally reference a few forum positing to make sure they know how to do it, but then tell them they can use less formal web links (apart for the formal assignments). Most work out what to do with a little help, some need to be referred for individual assistance.

Jude suggested "make not find" constructivist assignments to encourage students to not just find sources. Having a set of steps for the stud nets to carry out, so they are discouraged from leaving it until the deadline helps.

In my view educators need to adopt the customer friendly approach which those who sell assignments do, on "best assignment" websites. We could offer easy to use step by step assistance to the student to do their assignments. This assistance would not involve actually doing the work for the student, as the assignment factories do, but would give the students the help the need.

Jude Carroll, will present two seminars on 'Formative uses of TurnItIn' and 'Teaching International Students 'at University of Queensland in Brisbane, 16 November 2011.

See also:

• "COURSEWORK WHICH DISCOURAGES COPYING, COLLUSION OR CUT-AND-PASTE" , Jude Carroll, 2011
  

• Addressing Plagiarism, The Higher Education Academy, 2011