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Re: [xmca] FW: The Shadow Scholar - He writes your students' papers.
Thanks, Nancy. While the situation is not as bad as I thought, it is still
"ungood." The amount of coercion in American education has passed the limits of
my antiquated imagination - sort of a cross between 1984 and George Lakoff's
"conservative" family style, where punishment is considered nurturance, and
regimentation is considered teaching.
________________________________
From: Nancy Mack <nancy.mack@wright.edu>
To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
Sent: Mon, January 10, 2011 3:28:38 PM
Subject: Re: [xmca] FW: The Shadow Scholar - He writes your students' papers.
http://www.plagiarismtoday.com/2008/03/25/iparadigms-wins-turnitin-lawsuit/
Nancy Mack
Professor of English
Wright State University
http://www.wright.edu/~nancy.mack
----- Original Message -----
From: Karen Heckert <heckertkrs@yahoo.com>
Date: Monday, January 10, 2011 3:16 pm
Subject: Re: [xmca] FW: The Shadow Scholar - He writes your students' papers.
To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> Turnitin owns the copyright to all the papers I wrote for those
> classes? The
> rights to all the papers written by all the students that are
> forced to use it?
> That's bizarre. Outrageous. How can a professor compel a student
> to give up the
> rights to their own work? I sincerely hope you're mistaken.
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Greg Mcverry <jgregmcverry@gmail.com>
> To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> Sent: Mon, January 10, 2011 9:25:42 AM
> Subject: Re: [xmca] FW: The Shadow Scholar - He writes your
> students' papers.
>
> I have to agree with Jenna wholeheartedly. While blatant
> cheating as
> described by the "Shadow Scholar" does cross some ethical boundaries,
> students are ill-prepared for academic writing. Jenna gave a wonderful
> account of these issues in higher education. The line, "But we
> do our
> students a deep and lasting injustice by placing the blame
> solely on their
> shoulders," really resonated. The probelm, however, starts much
> earlier in
> education.
>
> We, as educators, simply do not do justice when it comes to teaching
> students to use multiple sources in primary and secondary school.
>
> I hear it all the time when providing professional development
> to teachers
> in the US. When I start talking about student combining ideas
> from online
> sources a teacher (usually high school) shouts out, "The middle school
> doesn't teach students to cite sources." To me that is the crux
> of the
> problem. Educators equate a complex intertextual process of
> constructing new
> ideas from old with the act of putting a comma in the right
> place using APA
> or MLA.
>
> Instead of addressing the issue teachers look to software such
> as TurnitIn.
> While the courts and I disagree I have issue with students
> having to
> unwillingly give up copyright of their work to TurnitIn which
> then owns the
> rights to that paper, makes a profit off the work, and offers
> the original
> author no credit. It seems like a business model built on
> plagiarism to
> catch plagiarism. I have to agree with those that comment taking
> a sentence
> (find the one with the semicolon) and throwing it into Google.
>
> I think though, instead of trying to catch plagiarism we need to teach
> students to use multiple sources and introduce academic
> discourses much
> earlier in education. It is the only way to stop the cycle of Colleges
> claiming high schools are to blame and high schools laying the
> blame at the
> doors of middle schools.
>
> Greg
>
> On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 9:02 AM, Jenna McWilliams
> <jennamcjenna@gmail.com>wrote:
> > I have loved reading this thread over the last several days.
> It's an issue
> > that interests me enormously, and one that I've thought about
> a lot. So
> > pardon the lengthy ramblings below....
> >
> > A few iterations of myself ago, I was a college composition
> and literature
> > instructor. Anyone who’s taught this particular category of
> courses knows
> > that cheating is an enormous issue: take the ramped-up
> pressure on young
> > people to set themselves apart from their peers in an era that
> has seen the
> > highest rate of college enrollment in the history of America;
> add to that
> > the increasingly fuzzy borders around what counts as
> ‘plagiarism’ in this
> > mixed up, multimodal, shareable world; and toss in a
> generation of students
> > who have received little guidance, if any, from adults on
> navigating issues
> > of plagiarism, copyright, appropriation and sharing of ideas
> and content.
> >
> > What you get: students who either don’t know or don’t care
> about why
> > universities care so much about the ethics of plagiarism.
> >
> > But we do our students a deep and lasting injustice by placing
> the blame
> > solely on their shoulders. One reason students plagiarize is
> that it’s easy:
> > Writing instructors often distribute the same essay
> assignments semester
> > after semester; they use essay prompts that are so worn, and
> so widely used,
> > that even students who honestly intend to just find supporting
> resources for
> > their essays online may end up having their entire papers
> mapped out for
> > them. (cf. Is Willy Loman a tragic hero?; Take a position on
> gay marriage.)
> > If we want our students to leave our classes and universities as
> > independent, creative thinkers, then we need to offer them
> opportunities to
> > think and write about things other than the stuff that every
> student in the
> > history of college has already had to slog through.
> >
> > Here’s the two-pronged approach I started to implement right
> before I left
> > teaching in favor of gainful employment and health insurance
> (I lived in
> > Massachusetts at the time, was an adjunct instructor and
> therefore not
> > offered health insurance, and could not afford to purchase
> state-mandated
> > insurance on an annual income that stayed safely below
> $20,000–even with the
> > part-time job I worked on top of teaching a full course load every
> > semester.): I developed writing assignments that a.) required
> students to
> > draft original writing and b.) offered a way in to
> conversations about the
> > difference between ethical appropriation and plagiarism.
> Here’s one thing I
> > tried: I asked students to draft a creative rewrite of a
> source text–they
> > could write a prequel, add a scene into the text, or rewrite
> or extend the
> > ending. Then they were required to analyze how their rewrite
> changed the
> > story, and in so doing, to demonstrate an understanding of the
> themes and
> > characters of the text. I only had time to try this once, but
> if I were to
> > do it again I would also have students think and write about the
> > appropriation / plagiarism issue as it relates to this
> assignment. I don’t
> > think it’s a perfect assignment by any means, and students who were
> > determined to cheat could still find a way to succeed, but
> it’s certainly
> > better–and more interesting–than the hackneyed old prompts
> that end up being
> > so easy to lift from teh Google.
> >
> > Being more creative instructors doesn’t solve the cheating
> issue, but it’s
> > certainly better than the strange alternative of simply adding
> more policing
> > to our learning environments. Did you see that NYTimes article
> about Caveon,
> > a security program that detects cheating by comparing
> students’ responses on
> > standardized tests (
> > http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/28/education/28cheat.html?_r=1)?
> > Apparently, lots of students are using their phones to give
> each other the
> > answers to test questions. Caveon also mines the internet for
> sites where
> > students discuss their answers on high-stakes tests like the LSAT.
> > Presumably, it notifies the makers of the test, who then
> remove the flagged
> > items from the next version.
> >
> > As you can imagine, this is a lucrative endeavor: "As tests are
> > increasingly important in education — used to determine
> graduation, graduate
> > school admission and, the latest, merit pay and tenure for
> teachers —
> > business has been good for Caveon, a company that uses “data
> forensics” to
> > catch cheats, billing itself as the only independent test
> security outfit in
> > the country."
> >
> > Well, at least students find out early what it’s like to live
> in a country
> > that generally believes that the best defense is a good
> offense: That
> > catching and punishing wrongdoers will deter others from going
> down the
> > wrong path. Never let the facts get in the way of a good
> theory: We’ll keep
> > passing ridiculously harsh drug laws even though they don’t
> deter people
> > from buying, selling, and using illegal drugs. Our
> politicians, supported by
> > right-wing pundits, will resist extending unemployment
> benefits in the worst
> > economic recession we’ve seen since the Great Depression. Why?
> Because> they’ve decided, in direct contradiction of the
> evidence, that America’s 15
> > million unemployed adults are lazy bums who just need a swift
> kick in the
> > ass.
> >
> > That’s the world our students are headed for, so they might as
> well learn
> > the lesson early that it’s a world that prefers punishment
> over dialogue,
> > short-term fixes instead of enduring solutions, and using
> bandaids to fix
> > gaping wounds.
> >
> > Look: students cheat on standardized tests because they know
> that the
> > stakes are really effing high. They cheat because they don’t
> see any reason
> > not to–because it’s not clear why ‘authentic’ achievement on a
> > multiple-choice exam is even worth striving for. They cheat
> because they
> > don’t see any connection between the contents of those tests
> and the subject
> > areas that matter to them as human beings. They cheat because
> the tests are
> > stupid but the scores are important.
> >
> > So instead of fixing a broken system with an overreliance on
> standardized> tests, we just add more cops–this time, in the
> form of computer programs.
> > Sure, that should work just fine. Just like it worked to add
> more proctors
> > to testing locations. Just like it worked to collect students’
> cellphones> before they began the exam. Just like it worked to
> guard test questions like
> > they were matters of national security.
> >
> > The low road is easier to walk, but it doesn’t offer much
> opportunity for
> > scaling mountains. In the coming decade, I would like to see
> us take the
> > higher road a little more frequently.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ~~
> >
> > Jenna McWilliams
> > Learning Sciences Program, Indiana University
> > ~
> > http://www.jennamcwilliams.com
> > http://twitter.com/jennamcjenna
> >
> > ~
> > jenmcwil@indiana.edu
> > jennamcjenna@gmail.com
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Jan 10, 2011, at 8:50 AM, Larry Purss wrote:
> >
> > I don't want to take a position on this topic, but was
> curious about what
> >> seems a contradiction between issues of "control and trust"
> in a manner
> >> similar to Engstrom's article on the use of technology in
> middle schools
> >> and
> >> putting computers in the hallway. I wonder if the
> concepts "control" and
> >> "trust" are primary or basic constructs when discussing
> institutional>> structures or containers. I was wondering
> when reading Engstrom's article
> >> if the terms control and trust were explanatory terms
> within 2nd person
> >> actor narratives or if Engstrom abstracted these terms as
> explanatory 3rd
> >> person narratives of what he observed in the middle school
> environment.>> Do
> >> others see a contradiction or tension in the discussion of
> plagarism or is
> >> it a clear case of civic virtue?
> >>
> >> Larry
> >>
> >> On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 12:40 AM, Rod Parker-Rees <
> >> R.Parker-Rees@plymouth.ac.uk> wrote:
> >>
> >> And I can also confirm that this extends to submissions
> to peer reviewed
> >>> journals, too. I have had the experience of receiving a
> paper which was
> >>> noticeably more lucid than the email which accompanied it, a
> quick bit of
> >>> googling revealed that the paper was the work of a student
> at a UK
> >>> university where the submitter had been working as a
> visiting academic.
> >>>
> >>> Rod
> >>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> > __________________________________________
> > _____
> > xmca mailing list
> > xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> > http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
> >
>
>
>
> --
> J. Gregory McVerry
> Neag Fellow
> University of Connecticut
> New Literacies Research Lab
> http://newliteracies.uconn.edu
> twitter: jgmac1106
>
>
> " [Champions] have to have the skill and the will. But the will
> must be
> stronger than the skill." -Ali
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