Deterring Plagiarism

There are many causes of plagiarism, such as:

• Students may lack knowledge of the causes of plagiarism
• The assignment tasks may be too generic and not specific enough which increases the likelihood that students can get access to previous, similar assignments or sites where you can 'pay for a paper'
• Students may be poor in managing time and planning for the effort required for the assignment, and believe that there is no choice but to plagiarize
• Students may view the course, the assignment, the conventions of academic documentation, or the consequences of cheating as unimportant
• Instructors and institutions may fail to report cheating when it does occur, or may not enforce appropriate penalties

As a course designer and teacher, it is best to educate students to prevent plagiarism and to design assessments to decrease the opportunities for plagiarism. Find out more from a series of previous CEI workshops conducted by Jude Carroll (Oxford Brookes University, UK) in December 2008 on “Detecting and Deterring Plagiarism – a workshop on detecting copying and devising assessment tasks that discourage it”.

Here are some suggestions:

• At the beginning of the course, explain clearly to students about plagiarism and the importance of academic integrity and proper referencing. Set clear assessment and grading criteria.
• Design assessment tasks that have intermediate steps and processes rather than just a final submission. Asking students to submit work-in-progress reports, review notes, drafts or revisions. These can help students to manage their time better and avoid last minute panics that might lead to plagiarism.
• Design assessments that require students to analyze, evaluate, and synthesize information rather than on memorization of facts and reproduction of materials.
• Personalize the assignment by adding context that requires a student to draw on their own experience or specific framework to encourage original work
• Use a combination of assessment methods and avoid using assignment title the could be easily copied from websites
• Use formative assessment tasks to provide regular feedback and help students understand that learning from their mistakes is a valuable part of their academic experience
• Avoid direct repetition of previous years' assessment questions or tasks. Changing elements of each assessment task each year and keep copies of student work from previous years to detect plagiarism. Have students submit final submissions to Turnitin (please see the next section on Originality Checking) so this can be done automatically for subsequent years.

For more information on designing out plagiarism, please see this Brief Guide for Busy Academics on Designing out plagiarism prepared by the University of Surrey, UK.