 |
 |
Thanks to everyone for your responses this has definitely given us some points for discussion around our collusion definition. I have collated below the responses I received, which I hope you will find useful. Kind regards Claire ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ We have seen a marked increase in the number of cases of collusion this year (although perhaps some of this can be attributed to increased use of Turnitin). Under our procedure all of the more serious cases of academic misconduct (including collusion) are considered by a central panel, which can apply a full range of penalties depending on the circumstances. This includes the ability to expunge marks / credits, require a student to repeat the assessment, cap a mark etc. However, we don’t necessarily give the 2 students involved in a collusion case the same penalty and there have been several instances where the student who copied has received a more severe penalty than the one who “lent” the work. The only instance where the student who “lent” the work has not received a penalty at all has been where there have been quite severe mitigating circumstances on the part of their friend. I agree with other posts that there is a difficult distinction between peer support and collusion. We certainly need to be clear to students about differences between sharing notes / assessment preparation and what constitutes collusion. I would be very interested to receive collated results as we are looking at developing a tariff / scoring system for next year. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- At Reading, I imagine this case would be handled under our normal 'plagiarism' definition for the Level 5 student (as they've submitted work that wasn't their own) and under our 'Providing assistance to another student in an act of plagiarism or falsification' for the Level 6 student (as they helped them plagiarise). We're actually getting rid of the 'providing assistance...' definition and replacing it with the simplest (and dictionary) definition of collusion 'Acting with another student with the intention to deceive' - this then covers a whole variety of situations including 'traditional' collusion of students submitting work at the same time that they've worked on together. So with our new definition the level 5 student would be accused of both plagiarism and collusion and the level 6 student just collusion. In terms of penalties we make a clear distinction between academic offences and behavioural ones. The former are any attempt to gain academic advantage for oneself or another by deceit - your case definitely meets our definition. I think therefore an academic penalty is appropriate for the Level 6 student - probably something that applies a penalty to his entire Part performance i.e. capping at 40 or knocking 10 marks off his average, as you are right it isn't possible to isolate an individual module to penalise. I would find it troubling if a student was not punished for 'aiding and abetting' as it were.... --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Would there be any recourse if, rather than a current student "providing assistance", it were a graduate supplying copies of the work they did while a student? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I think that would be difficult one..... our Regulations for Conduct only apply to 'students.' A former student is no longer within our jurisdiction therefore the only misconduct in that case is of the student plagiarising. We can set the rules for our students, but can't really for anyone else. Obviously the exception to the jurisdiction question is when the academic integrity of a degree is called into question - i.e. major plagiarism etc. which indicated an unjustified award/'academic fraud'. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I strongly agree. Learning from other students is a valuable educational tool, it is up to the examiners to create an environment where this can't be abused. When I was an undergraduate, we collected on behalf of the student council, and with official admin support from the Faculty, old exam papers and essays and made them available to students. That was seen as an essential learning tool. Now as a teacher, I also use "best and worst practice examples" and make past papers available to students. It simply means to vary questions sufficiently from year to year. I suppose in the regulations cited in the first email, this would be unproblematic for not being "without official approval", but my point is that this approval should be in scenarios like this be the norm, not the exception --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I have no view on whether the more stringent, or the more relaxed, view of collusion is better, but I do have a question. Most experienced writers who have to work in a new genre start by reading that genre to understand what's expected of them. Students who have to write a new sort of assessment activity would do well to read successful examples of that sort of assignment. If you adopt a punitive approach to students who lend out their (successfully) assessed work, how is it possible to separate those who intend to mentor 'younger' students in a supportive way from those who understand that their work will be copied? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- I would be wary about reducing the range of penalties. The circumstances could be anything from letting a student look at some work to see the sort of thing that's required (especially if it got a decent mark) to explicitly offering a previous piece of work for sale... i.e. anything from naivety to a business model. Proving which may be difficult. The better approach would be to ensure that the assessments preclude the possibility of this sort of thing arising in the first place (i.e. design it out, rather than regulate it out). -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yes, I agree designing it out is the best solution. Having said that, I had a case once where third year students were flat sharing with graduates from the previous year. Whilst one graduate was at work, a third year went into her room, switched on her computer and copied all her assignments onto a data stick. So the copied party may be completely innocent. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Please find below the RNCM's regulations concerning academic malpractice. I think we would probably treat this as cheating rather than collusion. REGULATIONS CONCERNING ACADEMIC MALPRACTICE 1. Definitions Academic malpractice is any activity that is likely to undermine the integrity essential to scholarship and research. It includes plagiarism, collusion, fabrication or falsification of results, cheating, contracting of someone to undertake work, and Anything else that is intended to achieve credit for those committing it that they do not properly deserve. (a) Plagiarism is the presentation of the ideas, work or words of other people without acknowledgement by the standard recognised means (e.g. footnotes, endnotes, picture captions). It also includes the submission, in whole or in part, of a student’s own work (self-plagiarism) where such work had been previously submitted for a different assessment. (b) Collusion occurs when a student or students collaborate inappropriately or illicitly with another student or students with the intention of improving the mark or grade of an individual or group. (c) Cheating is to copy another student’s work, or to have in possession, whether used or not, any unauthorised aids and/or materials belonging to other students (e.g. notes, essays) during the completion of an assessment. (d) Fabrication or Falsification of data or results by individual students or groups of students is the presentation or inclusion in assessments of figures or data unsupported by verifiable or documented programmes of research; this may or may not additionally involve instances of plagiarism and/or of collusion. (e) Contracting another person (who may or may not be a student) to complete a piece of assessed work whereby that person does work on behalf of a student. This includes assessments undertaken for someone else in full or in part, including the sitting of assessments for someone else, and obtaining material from other students. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- My view is that the L6 student is culpable and should be penalised. But I do not think they should lose their credits as the work they submitted was their own. Perhaps this is a case for a fine of some sort rather than an academic penalty. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ************************************************************************* You are subscribed to the JISC Plagiarism mailing list. To Unsubscribe, change your subscription options, or access list archives, visit http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/PLAGIARISM.html *************************************************************************