Knowledge Quest is a publication of the American Association of School Librarians. The theme for the January/February issue was doing "good work." Many of the articles focused on plagiarism, how we can encourage students to do their own work, etc. There were several useful bits of advice/information, such as:
- Students, especially gifted ones, feel an enormous pressure to not only succeed, but to excel. For many of them, this leads to cheating.
- Adults should model the behavior they want students to exhibit. (duh!)
- Teachers and libarians should strive to be sure that students are made aware of what constitutes plagiarism.
- Students should be given sample ethical questions to encourage critical thinking and to explore what it means to be ethical.
Where I became slightly less enthused is when some of the writers seemed to imply that students should not necessarily be punished or censured for unethical behavior. OK, I get that not every case of plagiarism is the same, and they we have a responsibility to educate, but by the time a student is enrolled in University, they should be aware of the fact that you cannot turn in an essay written by someone else as your own. People at some point must take responsibility for their own actions, and ignorance is no excuse. I am pretty sure that if I am caught speeding, the police officer is not going to let is slide if I say I didn't know the speed limit. Teachers have a responsibility to teach, but students also have to take responsibility for their own learning and for their own work. Let them take it; don't baby them, it does not make them better adults, it makes them codependent. I do agree with another point that was made, and that is that we should not treat students as if we expect them to cheat. Students will tend to do what you expect of them, and cheating is no different.
Just my two cents...
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