Student Writing and Plagiarism - How to Prevent Common Mistakes?

One of the skills that teachers want their students to practice and perfect is Internet research skills. This is, however, increasingly being plagued by plagiarism. Plagiarism is now regarded to be a mammoth problem that tutors in all levels of education, from middle school to college are finding particularly difficult to deal with. Copying materials from journals, books, or Internet sources and representing such as one’s own creation is deceitful. Worth noting is that these deceitful practices are now being embraced by earlier grades as access to the Internet continues to grow. A shocking revelation by the Center for Academic Integrity in 2003 showed that 73 percent and 66 percent of seventh grade and sixth graders, respectively, admitted to regularly using materials not of their own without giving credit. To promote writing originality and to prevent students from submitting materials of other people for academic credit, the following top ten ways can guide educators.

Turnitin is a reliable service that educators can use to encourage originality. This is a plagiarism prevention resource which makes detection whenever over eight words are used in an essay without the identification of the original source. Turnitin is popular in schools, both public and private in all states, considering that more than 30,000 essays and articles are submitted on a typical day for checking. The cost of the service, however, can be substantial which is why there are other alternative ways that educators can consider, like ensuring that the purpose of every project or task provided is clear. The tutor should also invite dialogue from students with regard to methods, resources as well as the types of papers that are suitable for submission.

A third way which educators can ensure that students submit materials of their own is establishing relevance for their students. This can be achieved by confirming the connection between the project and real life through, for example, experiences that go beyond the perspective provided by the text. Another way would be encouraging students to convey their feelings and describe the processes they used in reaching their conclusions. A fifth way would be emphasizing creative behavior and higher-order thinking. Educators should emphasize that instead of reporting just knowledge, the participation of students should entail practice with higher-level thinking abilities.

Further, educators should go beyond the expected scope for problem solving. Many times students use provided questions whereby their teachers are already aware of the answers. Coming up with alternative solutions and developing choices is usually the key to overcoming challenges. A seventh way would be encouraging different types of information gathering. Educators would require that submissions are made of a hard copy of Web information and this goes along with the same information interpreted and summarized in a student’s personal words.
The other way is with regard to assessing the quality of performance. Educators should identify the criteria to be used when assessing the quality of research work submitted. When students know beforehand the criteria by which their submissions will be judged, especially with regard to plagiarism, they can focus on the work without anxiety and reporting plagiarized work at the end. The ninth way would be allowing the students to reflect and improve their final essay.  When students have access to suggestions from classmates, this can greatly help in teaching them more about plagiarism, in addition to accepting constructive criticism. The last, but not least, approach is the use of oral evaluation. This approach allows students to make their opinions known verbally and enables the educator to call for clarification in cases whereby points are not clear and most importantly, eliminates the use of technology media to submit materials of other people.

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About the Perfect Academic Research

To determine whether there is any hope of doing perfect research, one must first be able to accurately define research. According to an article on, in its broadest sense, research can be defined as investigation and writing based upon the idea of scientific inquiry. Scientific inquiry is explained as the assumption that everything is based on cause and reaction, and research attempts to examine and explain this relationship (“The Research Process”). While it might be next to impossible to ever do perfect research, this paper will argue that there is always hope that someday it might be achieved.

First, we must look at why research is done in the first place. Scientists, scholars, and students alike do research with the hopes of explaining phenomena in order to either control the outcome of a particular topic, or to make polices or procedures that will positively affect the research subjects. Next, one must look at the word ‘perfect’. Taken at face value, the word perfect is subjective. What is considered perfect to one researcher might not be considered perfect to another. Finally, one must understand the motivations of the researchers. Most often, the goal is to improve whatever subject it is being studied.

If the researchers are not striving for perfection, this paper argues, then why bother doing it at all? For example, let us examine the issue of the death penalty. There have been numerous debates throughout the years as to whether or not the death penalty deters individuals committing crimes. Many people strongly support the death penalty for a variety of reasons, including the need for retribution or based on moral beliefs. Likewise, many oppose capital punishment for these very same reasons: they are morally opposed to executing people, and do not believe in revenge. Scholars have examined the issue at length over the years, and, like the general public, have differing opinions on whether or not capital punishment deters crime and reduces the crime rate. In one studied published in 2009, the authors examined death penalty eligibility factors for those convicted of child murder. They analyzed data from states that changes their requirements for who would be eligible to receive the ultimate penalty between the years 1985 and 2001. 

Based on their analysis, the authors concluded that had the states not changed their eligibility requirements, that is, making it more difficult to imposed the penalty on a convicted offender, the rate of child homicide would have been as much as 20% lower than it was. Another study, published in 2010, came to a different conclusion. Analyzing state-level data from 1995 -2006, the researcher measured homicide rates per 100,000 population. The basic premise behind this study is that states with high execution rates would have lower homicide rates and vice versa. However, the professional researchers and essay writers were unable to find such a connection. The state with the highest execution rate for example, Texas, did not have a statistically meaningful lower homicide rate than states without the death penalty. Furthermore, the study was unable to find any significant deterrent effect of capital punishment on homicide in other states. So, what is the point of all this academic research, some might ask. If there are two relatively recent studies regarding the same subject, namely the death penalty, and each study comes to a different conclusion, this shows there is no hope in doing perfect research, many would argue. This paper disagrees.

Research is an essential element in explaining phenomena. Although those conducting the research might never be able to do ‘perfect’ research, the hope is always there. Much research is based upon previous studies conducted years ago. It is up to each researcher to strive to come as close to perfect as possible. Perhaps the question should be “There is no hope of obtaining a perfect outcome”? As researchers, we can always perfect our methods and use sound scientific principles. That is the key in doing ‘perfect’ research. The outcome might not be what one expects, and therefore not ‘perfect’, but it is up to the researchers to come as close as possible in achieving that goal.