Erik has made good points.

My own view of proof-readers is that the services of these 
are sought mainly by international students or able home 
students with particular difficulties with written 
communication; they may, for example, be dyslexic. In our 
School we have recoommendations that staff do not 
proof-read assignments, because it is so time-consuming, 
but we have a list of proof-readers they can use.

In this context, the use of proof-readers could be regarded
as offering opportunities to equalise a relationship in 
higher education that is weighted toward the home student 
(or those educated in English as a first teaching language)
with good command of written English. 

Poor written English, in a course work assignment submitted 
by an international student, can lead to a poor mark from 
exasperated markers at busy marking periods because 
communication has broken down.

As regards plagiarism, I feel that if a proof-reader spots 
this, because of a change of writing style, then others 
will too, and that the reader should point this out to the 
student.  

The student may be, despite all the warnings, still be 
unsure of what constitutes plagiarism, particularly in the 
area of copy & re-write from the Internet.  Prevention is 
better than prosecution.

Colin Neville
Univ Bradford, School of Management


On Wed, 8 Mar 2006 10:18:04 -0000 Erik Borg 
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Normally, I find I agree with Mike, but I'm uncomfortable with the easy
> assumption, here and in the thread about proofreading, that these are simple
> black & white questions.  
> 
> When I write an important document--a module descriptor, some e-mails,
> journal articles and so on--I try to get someone else to read it for tone,
> content and, yes, language accuracy.  Is this collusion?  When a journal
> article is accepted, do the anonymous reviewers become co-authors?
> 
> I spoke the other day with a friend who was going to have a mock viva with
> his supervisor.  Is this collusion?
> 
> I work mostly with international students.  Although they may have good
> subject knowledge they often have difficulty with language accuracy.  There
> are broad rules for the choice of articles (a, an, the), for example, but
> there are significant exceptions.  If a mother tongue like Chinese doesn't
> have articles at all, it's extremely difficult to get them right.  Students
> who can do that are far beyond IELTS 7.  Many of these students are
> terrified of making errors in grammar and word choice.  If it's wrong for
> them to use a proof reader, how do you, as a marker treat their papers?  Do
> grammatical errors that don't impede your understanding result in lower
> marks?  Does that mean that only linguistically exception students can earn
> marks equivalent to home students?
> 
> I realise that EAP and study skills units don't have the time or resources
> to proofread the papers of all the students who want their help, and so it
> does make sense for these units to limit the help they offer.  But to say
> that proofreading is cheating seems to set a standard for students that
> isn't applied elsewhere.  Maybe that's fine, but I don't think simple or cut
> and dried.
> 
> Erik Borg
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Plagiarism [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Mike Reddy
> Sent: 08 March 2006 00:53
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Edit for hire question
> 
> > A vocational conundrum, of sorts: Would it be ethically appropriate 
> > for me to market my services as a for-compensation editor of student 
> > papers in sociology (in which I have a doctorate) and kindred 
> > disciplines?
> 
> Simple answer: No.
> 
> Explanation of the simple answer: It's their assignment, not yours. The 
> fact that you have to ask worries me.
> 
> Complex answer: NO!
> 
> Explanation of the complex answer: It's their learning opportunity, not 
> yours. If they need support to learn how to write an essay, or how to 
> structure an argument, or how to best present their research, etc. it 
> is their lecturer's job, and possibly a study skills or drop in 
> centre's job, for which they have already paid!
> 
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C Neville
[log in to unmask]

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