wolven7 | Serious Business (Reply)

Serious Business, originally uploaded by fenryswlf.

Today, I had to talk to my class about plagiarism.

This is what I wore.

For the first hour, we finished up with Metaphysics, as I told them I would. And then we did something Different. As I told them we would.

The first thing I did was read them the Academic Honesty Statement on the syllabus, telling them that, from this point on, I would want their citations all in the Same Style. That, if whole paragraphs went uncited, if there were no references to the works used as resources, then that That Paper Would Fail. The next time it happened, that Student would fail.

I told them that it would take longer to get papers back, now, because of the things I would have to do to check their papers. How I'd have to run it through Turnitin. Or Plagiarism.org. Or even just Google.

I paused. I looked down at the floor and I said, "'Academic Dishonesty'... is a Hollow Phrase. Plagiarism is... betrayal of trust." I told them about Dr Herman and the talks he used to have to give, and I told them about how the dynamic had now changed, between us.

"Before this, we could get along, we could talk, have a conversation. We liked each other." I smiled.

The smile fell away. "Now. Now there's mistrust. Now there's worry. Now there's suspicion. And not just from Me, but also, for you. Because now you are going to be Freaking. Out. about whether you cited your sources correctly.

"And I didn't want that."

I told them, "You are all paying money to be here. You have all made the Choice to be here. (There's that word again);" (we'd been talking about free will, earlier). "If you aren't going to do the work... Then there's the door. Go somewhere else. Do Something Else.

"But if you're going to be here, then you better do the work. Because if I'm going to be here, then you can be damn sure I'm going to do the work. And if you Waste My Time with this... Well. With these "mistakes" that I've encountered. Then I'm going to be displeased.

"If you don't want to be here, you can go, right now. I don't want to waste your time. I don't want you to waste my time. And I DAMN sure don't want you wasting your classmates' time.

"Now! We have about five minutes left: Who's got questions about the test?"

And that was my plagiarism talk.

The two culprits looked suitably abashed, and the entire class looked really uncomfortable. Afterward, several people came up to me to ask me about the method of their citations, thus far.

I rate this "I am both seethingly angry and vastly disappointed in you" lecture a success.

Good night.