Plagiarism

I love writing. I love talking about writing. But sometimes I don't love teaching writing. Out of 27 papers turned in my Writing in Psychology class, four were plagiarized. Two of these were almost completely copied word for word off the net. The other two had substantial sections copied word for word. Because I've dealt with plagiarism before, far too many times, I put information on plagiarism into my syllabus. It's also covered several times in the book we use, and we've had two quizzes about plagiarism already in the class. I start DAY 1 with a discussion of plagiarism, and discuss it again before every paper is due. I tell you, it just hurts my soul a little bit to see it happen despite all that discussion. Not to mention that it adds a lot of extra work to a job that is already pretty tough.

Anyway, three of the individuals were given "F's on their papers and asked to drop the class. I've not been able to contact the fourth yet. Wow, it's just really been fun.

In the meantime, though, I have gotten some good news on my own writing front. "Chimes" got great reviews from: Rick and Kate. Thanks so much to them both. I really appreciate it.

The FDA inspector is here and has all the files. Nothing much to do now but wait. I'll try to get around to a few blogs today.

Best to all.
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