Any students that can give advice on this situation?

DezUk · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:19

Hi Guys

I am looking for some advice from the students of the forum.

On Friday my girlfriend got a letter from her uninversity calling her in for plagerism. She had used a copy of hers frinds essay o help her write her re submit. Now I am just wondering if anyone has had this happen and can help me tell her what to expect?

Now before you all start i know what she has done is wrong and i have told her she should just go and fess up to what she has done and say sorry.

She is to go to uni tomorrow and speak to one of the head markers about the situation, so any advice would be appreciated.

Anewbe4u · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:24

Run away to America

Raymond Lin · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:25

She'll prob be asked to do the work again with 40 being the max mark she can get and this will be on her record so if in the future she applies to jobs that ask if she had found guilty of this she'll have to say yes. Unless she wants to fight the charges.

stevenazari1 · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:25

if she fesses up she's out.

let them ask the questions, give light answers and hope for the best.

if they reference her friends work say she helped her but supplied no documents - it was all suggestive.

if your gf has copied it word for word she has no case.

Phoebs · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:26

i thought plagerism resulted in a fail for the year? or does it depend which uni u go to?

weringo · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:26

I'd be surprised if she wasn't kicked out

geuben · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:28

This can be pretty serious. My uni (sheffield) sent emails around about some cases, where people were expelled from the uni for plagiarism in their dissitations. I don't think owning up will make thier punishment any less severe. How badly did she plagiarise the other persons work?

Raymond Lin · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:30

Just notice that it was a resubmit? She failed the first one already? Er, she'll be in more trouble than i thought then, if they let her re do it again then it won't be til the summer or may have to re sit the year. Worst case is get kick out obviously. Why did she do it anyway? At most she should only use the same reference list and write her own words and not base it on another student's essay, how stupid is that.

Gooner14 · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:32

Raymond Lin said:
She'll prob be asked to do the work again with 40 being the max mark she can get and this will be on her record so if in the future she applies to jobs that ask if she had found guilty of this she'll have to say yes. Unless she wants to fight the charges.

Happened to me, and was only on my record for 2 years.

Maccy · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:32

My sister was recently accused for plagarism but had referenced all the sources. The issue was that the tutor hadn't seen the source and therefore assumed straight away that she'd copied it.
Doesn't really help, but I'd go with "only speak when spoken to"

jackthezipper · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:33

If it's only a little she could say she read the friends essay the first time round and got some of her ideas from it but looked up the material herself. If it's that obvious though she might be in trouble.

Nazca · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:35

Two of my mates (one being my housemate) got done for plagiarising someone elses essay. They just got a zero for that piece of coursework. I guess it depends on the marker or the convener and how lenient/strict they are. They don't want to fail you (in this case your girlfriend) but they have to punish them somehow because it is a very serious academic offence.

PlatinumFX · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:35

If she directly plagerised, she'll get what she deserves regardless of what she says or thinks. If she didn't, she's best to come straight with exactly what she did and try to argue her case to defend herself and salvage the degree.

[TR]SweetSpotOz · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:36

geuben · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:36

Maccy said:
My sister was recently accused for plagarism but had referenced all the sources. The issue was that the tutor hadn't seen the source and therefore assumed straight away that she'd copied it.
Doesn't really help, but I'd go with "only speak when spoken to"

My uni (well I think it's only some departments) use an automated plagiarism detection service (Turnitin) which does have the possiblility to wrongly accuse someone, but from what the OP says it would appear that she did copy.

Raymond Lin · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:37

I actually went to one of there meetings with a friend as a 'advocate' thou my friend's situation was different as she reference it wrong and forgot to put it in quote but had a reference list in the end. She had to redo it and resubmit at 40%

Mr^B · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:37

Be honest, because she hasn't been so far.

3 people I know at Uni were caught either stealing work (literally stealing computer print-outs) or copying directly out of journals, etc. All were failed the year.

Robert · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:38

They go deep when investigating plagiarism, so I'd tell her to be prepared for a grilling.

In the worst case she could be kicked out, though I hope it doesn't come to that.

Hate · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:39

A friend and I got called in for it after she used my computer (had a floppy disc drive) to print it.

You had to electronically submit it, so she printed hers from her disk and i printed mine and off we went.

We handed in both documents but attached the wrong disc to each essay, got called up but they saw the mistake!

Dreadi · 27 Jan 2008 at 19:40

Happened to me in college by change (collusion is it) We both got our first year mark and got kicked off.
Happened to my idiot ex when she let her now idiot boyfriend copy her work for an english paper, she lucky got away with it, he got kicked off