Recycling an assignment

[Landshark]

I'm sure most of you are familiar with TurnItIn.com, an internet software that assists teachers in detecting plagiarism.  It can match up sources from thousands of websites and it color codes the matches to show how high of a match it is and which sources were used.  Also, each time a paper is scanned, it produces a record of that exact paper and shows who scanned it. 

I scan all my papers on TurnItIn.com before I grade them.  Three weeks ago, I had a student who turned in a paper, and when I scanned it, TurnItIn.com alerted me that it was nearly identical to one of the papers a colleague of mine in the English department had scanned in.  I knew this professor very well, so I asked her who the student was, and it turned out my student had taken her course the term before this one. 

I reported the student for an Academic Dishonesty violation, but the student gave me a earful, saying how it's not plagiarism if he was the one who originally wrote the paper.  The student is currently appealing my report and we are scheduled to go before the Academic Dishonesty Committee before the term is over.  Sadly, there is nothing specific in the GCCC Code of Conduct that forbids recycling an assignment, so I guess it will depend on how the committee members feel. 

What do you guys think?  Is it dishonest to use a paper twice?  Have you ever done that before?

[Phishfan]

I was an education major in school (though I decided against that path). I personally don't have a problem if a student uses an original paper twice, provided it meets the criteria put forth. I can see your side of things though, but I'm just not sure I can agree with it.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

I don't view it as dishonest at all.

Unless the school or the syllabus has clear and unambiguous policy against doing this then the student has done absolutely nothing wrong.  I did have one professor in college who did include such a policy in his syllabus. 

You're reporting of this as a violation of Academic Dishonesty knowing full well that the student did not violate any school rules or any policy stated by you is a sickening abuse of power.   

If you don't want students to this in future include such a prohibition on the syllabus.  But with this student you should immediately notify the ADC board you are withdrawing the report and apologize to the student.   

[Dave Gray]

If you wrote it, it's yours.  Use it as many times as you like, for any reason.  It's as simple as that.

[fyo]

Gotta say I'm with the majority here. I really hope this doesn't hurt the student in the long run.

[Landshark]

I don't view it as dishonest at all.

Unless the school or the syllabus has clear and unambiguous policy against doing this then the student has done absolutely nothing wrong.  I did have one professor in college who did include such a policy in his syllabus. 

You're reporting of this as a violation of Academic Dishonesty knowing full well that the student did not violate any school rules or any policy stated by you is a sickening abuse of power.   

If you don't want students to this in future include such a prohibition on the syllabus.  But with this student you should immediately notify the ADC board you are withdrawing the report and apologize to the student.   

In terms of your opinion, I understand where you're coming from, but to say I am abusing my power is a little extreme there.  I feel that this student did not put forth the effort needed to complete the asignment and took the easy way out by using the same paper twice. 

I will admit that I made a mistake by not specifically forbidding this practice in my syllabus, simply because I've never dealt with this situation before.   That is obviously going to change.  This is a learning experience for me regardless of how the ADC rules.

[Spider-Dan]

Let me ask you a simple question: did you issue this assignment to keep your students busy, or because you wanted them to demonstrate their knowledge of/competence in a given subject?

If it's the latter, then your student has already demonstrated that (in the previous course).  You should be grading his paper on its own merit.  If it's the former, why not just have them write duplicate sentences and turn that in?

I don't know what the topic of your paper was, but he's clearly already done the research and written the paper.  Isn't that the point of the exercise?

As far as modifying your syllabus to specifically prohibit this activity in the future, instead, why not just make your assignments original enough that students cannot simply submit copies of other papers they've written during their academic career?  If you're issuing such unoriginal assignments, I humbly submit that the blame lies with you.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

make your assignments original enough that students cannot simply submit copies of other papers they've written during their academic career? 

The only problem with that is it forces the teacher and student into a small box and does not allow for the broad "further in-depth research into any area related to the course material covered in this class" type papers.  Or pick something from anyone of these topics.

For example from my own life, in high school we were required to analysis a poem in junior year English class, any poem in the text book.  I choose my favorite.  In college I had a similar assignment and one of the optional poems was the one I had written about.  The two papers were very similar (I used the feedback from my high school teacher for areas of improvement and wrote a slightly better paper the second time.)  Had the college professor limited the class to one specific poem, odds are I would not been able to do that.  But he would have created an assignment that would be less interesting to all his student (except those for whom it was their favorite poem) and less interesting to grade, because he would have been reading about the same poem over and over again instead of a variety of them. 

Every professor I have ever had has used at least a paragraph of the syllabus to repeat the rules regarding plagiarism, even though totally unnecessary, because the school rules apply even absents it being on particular professors syllabus.  Anybody who has attended college (so that includes all of my professors) is fully aware of assignment recycling unless they are a complete and utter moron or had absolutely no friends in college given how frequently it happens and how openly it is discussed among students.  Thus any professor who does not state on his/her it is prohibited is clearly indicating it is completely acceptable. 

The reason why schools don't have the blanket prohibition in their policies like they do with plagiarism is that not all professors have a problem with it and thus leave it up to the individual professors to set their own policies. 


   

[StL FinFan]

How can you plagiarize yourself?  I don't think it was dishonest at all.  If you write it, it's yours, even if you wrote it a while back.  Unless there is a rule about re-using a previously written paper, the student did nothing wrong.  I would let the student know that in the future, I expect original material, but I would remove the complaint.

[Lee]

If an assignment is similiar to one that I have completed in the past, I have no qalms about re-using my own work.

[Landshark]

I don't know what the topic of your paper was, but he's clearly already done the research and written the paper.  Isn't that the point of the exercise?

As far as modifying your syllabus to specifically prohibit this activity in the future, instead, why not just make your assignments original enough that students cannot simply submit copies of other papers they've written during their academic career?  If you're issuing such unoriginal assignments, I humbly submit that the blame lies with you.

My assignments are original.  Keep in mind that I teach business courses and the student wrote the paper for an English course that just happened to be on the topic that my assignment was on.

Anybody who has attended college (so that includes all of my professors) is fully aware of assignment recycling unless they are a complete and utter moron or had absolutely no friends in college given how frequently it happens and how openly it is discussed among students.  Thus any professor who does not state on his/her it is prohibited is clearly indicating it is completely acceptable. 

The reason why schools don't have the blanket prohibition in their policies like they do with plagiarism is that not all professors have a problem with it and thus leave it up to the individual professors to set their own policies. 

Again, I'll admit that I made a mistake by not specifically prohibiting this behavior on my syllabus, but believe you me, this is the first time I've dealt with this issue as a professor.  I am aware that it takes place and I despise it.  I never did it when I was in college.  And back then, it was a lot easier to "buy" someone else's term paper because the Internet did not exist.     

How can you plagiarize yourself?  I don't think it was dishonest at all.  If you write it, it's yours, even if you wrote it a while back.  Unless there is a rule about re-using a previously written paper, the student did nothing wrong.  I would let the student know that in the future, I expect original material, but I would remove the complaint.

I'll stop short of saying the student plagiarized, but this is something I despise as well.  To me, submitting the same paper for more than one class represents a lack of effort on the part of the student.  When a student is given an assignment, I expect them to put forth the effort required to complete the assignment each time I assign something. 

The more I look at this and look at everyone's responses, I realize that I may lose out on this one, but I can make changes so that this doesn't happen again.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

You still don't get it. 

It is not nearly enough to admit you might lose in front of the committee.  Anything short of immediately emailing the committee withdrawing the complaint and emailing the student and apologizing is being a compete and total asshole.

There was no policy banning this.  You were aware it occurs.  You're lack of saying anything about it on the syllabus was the same as saying it is perfectly acceptable. 

Now you are putting a student who did nothing wrong through the stress because you are on some sort of fucking ego trip. 

If you choose to take this to the committee my hope is that their responses is not only to dismiss your complaint, but to dismiss you as an employee with a hearing in six months to determine if it will also result in a full forfeiture of your pension.  That way you can go the stress he is going thru.  The only difference is he doesn't deserve to go through this stress and you do should be fired. 

[Lee]

You still don't get it. 

It is not nearly enough to admit you might lose in front of the committee.  Anything short of immediately emailing the committee withdrawing the complaint and emailing the student and apologizing is being a compete and total asshole.

There was no policy banning this.  You were aware it occurs.  You're lack of saying anything about it on the syllabus was the same as saying it is perfectly acceptable. 

Now you are putting a student who did nothing wrong through the stress because you are on some sort of fucking ego trip. 

If you choose to take this to the committee my hope is that their responses is not only to dismiss your complaint, but to dismiss you as an employee with a hearing in six months to determine if it will also result in a full forfeiture of your pension.  That way you can go the stress he is going thru.  The only difference is he doesn't deserve to go through this stress and you do should be fired. 

While I think this is extreme, I do agree with your general idea Hoodie.  I do believe that Landshark should withdraw the complaint.  Besides not being anywhere near the definition, you will be wasting that committee's time as I believe the outcome will be the same --- dismissal.  Re-using one's own work is something that is standard in the school system.  Plus, I seriously doubt you yourself never did the same thing when you were younger.  You really have to think about the trade-off of following the rules versus hurting a student's reputation and future career (and perhaps your own reputation and future career).

[Brian Fein]

Question for LandShark:

Do you re-use the same syllabus every semester? 

How about exams?  Assignments?

[fyo]

Landshark... I really don't understand your position on this issue. While I've never come across this scenario myself, even in graduate school, I wouldn't have any problem with it and doubt any of the instructors I've had would have had a problem either. If I've already solved a problem, what use is it to anyone for me to solve that same problem again? I'm not plagiarizing anyone, I'm simply using work I've done previously. Preventing me from doing so is, to me, the same as saying that I cannot take any course where I already know a substantial part of the syllabus. I would be reusing my knowledge in that case, regardless of any assignments, and thereby cheating in your book.

What would your position be if a student was given the exact same assignment in two difference classes? With little or no room to tackle a different sub-topic? Should the student ask for a new, unique assignment? Or just fail the course automatically, since any attempt to hand in the assignment would be tantamount to plagiarism? (which appears to be your position).