“It should be taught earlier,” Sarah Hogenbirk, a history instructor at Carleton, said. “University shouldn’t be the first time people are hearing about it.”
Workshops through the Learning Support Services exist mostly for this reason, according to Jim Kennelly, an ombudsperson at Carleton, who said the number of plagiarism cases is slowly decreasing because of it.
“We do have a number of students who come to university—especially in first year—who really don’t understand how to cite,” he said. “We’re seeing the numbers of plagiarism go down slightly, but they’re coming down—which is a good thing. But a lot of it is students don’t understand.”
Another reason students may not be informed well enough is if they’re an international student. While English tests are required for incoming students, Kennelly said the difference in essay writing style can pose a bit of an issue for international students.
“First-year and international students don’t understand what’s expected in North American universities when it comes to citing. A lot do, but a lot do not,” he said. “But that’s a part of university, learning the right way to cite. Nobody is saying, ‘okay, first year you’ve got to cite properly or you’re out of here.’ In that case there may be a penalty, and we want you to take this course on how to cite properly.”
A 2008-2009 report from the University of Windsor’s academic integrity officer found that one in 82 international students was accused of academic misconduct, compared to the one in 300 domestic students accused.
The penalties are indeed a question mark in terms of what students can look at facing, but according to Susan Whitney, the associate Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) dean, the consequences of plagiarism cases are more about educating the student rather than offering straight punishment.
“Since we’re a university and not a court of law, one of the things we try to do is both educate students about plagiarism and how you do research correctly, as well as punish them,” she said. “It’s a system that’s very well set up to treat students very fairly.”
Her role in the process in dealing with academic integrity cases is to make the final decision as to what should be done with the student to address the case of plagiarism, as with all associate deans. This is after she receives the evidence of plagiarism from the student’s professor and has a sit down interview with the student themselves.
“The penalties can range being specific to the assignment to being specific for the course,” she said. “I mean obviously if they’ve downloaded an entire paper from 123helpme!!.com then that would be more serious.”
An upper-year student’s case generally has more severe punishment—like an F in the course—than that of a first-year student, she said, and multiple offences would dictate suspension from the school.
Kennelly’s role in the process is to act as a support system for the student, and is present at every interview across the faculties they would have with an associate dean. They also act as an advisor for students prior to the interview by having a personal meeting with them where they provide the student with a photocopy of what the professor deemed to be plagiarism.
“I have to say, the policy for dealing with plagiarism and cheating is one of the fairest policies I’ve ever seen Carleton write,” he said. “And students are protected by our office in knowing the process and making sure they’re treated fairly by the associate deans.”
Kennelly added that upon graduation, any documentation related to a student’s academic dishonesty is destroyed so that future employers can’t access it.
One anonymous Carleton student said they accidentally plagiarized on a group assignment because of miscommunication about the assignment’s instructions. They said their entire group handed in the same paper, save for the analysis section, which each group member wrote their own version.
“I think it mostly comes down to slight confusion and ignorance,” they said. “Guidelines should have been looked into with more care.”
They said they felt they were treated fairly during the process that followed the accusation of plagiarism.
“I think failing the class as a consequence for the action was unfortunate,” they said. “I respect the decision and understand why it was necessary.”
