Either out of laziness, desperation or envy, plagiarism plagues many a mind. While it may depend on the class or subject, some professors don’t see it as an issue here at Keene State. History Professor Dr. Thomas E. Whitcomb said, “I haven’t seen evidence of it.”
Assistant Professor/Academic Technology Librarian Irene McGarrity, she said she has seen it a lot as a professor, but not so much as a librarian. “I think a lot of the cases are unintentional…where a student doesn’t understand that what they’re doing is plagiarism,” she said.
McGarrity said she has also noticed unintentional plagiarism commonly with students who don’t speak English as their native language; since the language is so different, it can be stressful to for many of these students to get a paper done in time. “Sometimes trying to say something you know, when you express a thought in English, it might take you a minute to write a sentence, but for this person, it could take half an hour to just get that [one] sentence correct,” McGarrity said.
According to the academic honesty policy, in regards to international students, there is aid available from the Global Education Office for students who may have issues with academic honesty. It is mentioned though “that all Keene State students will be held accountable for adhering to the Academic Honesty Policy,” which includes students traveling abroad as well.
McGarrity continued, “There’s not really malicious intent there, [the students are] just sort of trying to make best of the situation and do okay on the paper.”
McGarrity said, however, she has had students who know what they’re doing, and said she thinks students who don’t get caught plagiarising are more likely to do it again. “[It] becomes sort of a perpetuating thing. I’ve had students who definitely knew that they were plagiarizing; they knew what they were doing was wrong, they just hoped that they could get away with it,” she said.
Associate Vice President/Dean of Students Gail Zimmerman said that she doesn’t really deal with these issues of academic honesty or plagiarism. “The way that we handle academic honesty violations here at Keene State is strictly through the facility,” she said.
Brendan Goodwin/ Equinox Staff
Zimmerman said that, unlike many other schools, KSC doesn’t go through a code of conduct; instead it is dealt with the faculty member and student individually and then sent to an academic dean, of which there are many spread throughout campus. “Sometimes students will certainly come to me if they have been charged with a violation, and then need personal advice,” she said.
McGarrity said that, in the library, while they do help people cite their sources, people also expect help with how to prevent plagiarism. “We’ve definitely been approached in the library for different solutions to that; I mean I think best way to combat it is through education, and explaining to students…the value of the written word and what it means to attribute words to somebody else,” she said.
KSC sophomore Dyllin Bates said that people should empathize with the original writer. He said, “Using someone else’s work without their permission is wrong because someone obviously put their heart and soul into it.” Bates said he’s a writer and would be very upset if someone took credit for his work.
Besides feelings being hurt, there are also ramifications that the college has in place. Dean Zimmerman said, “There are different forms of academic dishonesty, so plagiarism often means the unattributed use of information.”
She said there are three different levels for the intensity of the offense on how then to handle it appropriately. “[With] each violation, there’s a rubric…the sanction is going to depend on where in that rubric of egregiousness the violation is considered,” Zimmerman said.
She said there is a relatively small amount of students who have multiple violations against them, but students almost always learn from the first violation not to do it again. “There’s also typically an educational component [of the ramification],” she said.
Dean Zimmerman also said that the Keene State College Senate will be reviewing the policy this year.
Dr. Karen Stanish, chair of the College Senate, said, “The actual policy is just being reviewed; it might be changed, it might not.”
Stanish said that there will definitely be small changes made, like updating names and taking out the mention of an electronic system that no longer exists. She said the reason they are reviewing it is because the academic honesty policy requests a periodic review for every three years it is in effect.
Stanish said, “It will happen during this academic year; [however] any changes wouldn’t be put into place until the following academic year.”
As for the currency of plagiarism occurrences, Stanish said, “There are always cases of plagiarism, we’re not seeing any more or less than there’s always been.”
She continued, “I think maybe the important thing is for students to make sure that you’re educating yourself about how to give credit to other’s work if you’re using it; how to do your own thoughts. The more you educate yourself, the more you can avoid unintentional potential plagiarism. I think a lot of the time, it’s unintentional simply because [there’s] a lack of understanding how [it happens].
Dorothy can be contacted at dengland@kscequinox.com
