Detecting and Deterring Plagiarism The Web: Hindrance or Help?
The issue of plagiarism has been around for centuries, but its impact has escalated with the growth of the world wide web, with its vast range of content, easy opportunities for cut-and-paste, and growing market of commercial sites helping the potential plagiarist. The education sector has seen a significant increase in cases of plagiarism in recent years, with observers suspecting that many more cases go undetected and/or unreported. While sophisticated online services can help with the detection of web-based plagiarism, long-term deterrence lies with appropriate course design and effective institutional policies.
Topics:
- Definition and examples of plagiarism
- The impact of the web on plagiarism, including essay banks and bespoke services
- Different methods of web-based detection
- Designing out opportunities for plagiarism and collusion in teaching and learning
- Policies and sanctions to deal with plagiarism
Who is it for?
This practical workshop, in association with the JISC Plagiarism Advisory Service, explores web-based and other methods of detecting and deterring plagiarism, and is aimed in particular at teaching, administrative and library staff in further and higher education institutions who wish to find out more about this complex and controversial subject and how to deal with it.
Participants need no special technical skills; however, it is expected that they will have some understanding and/or experience of teaching and learning in further or higher education and will be familiar with using the Internet. For the hands-on sessions they will find it helpful to have had some experience of using a browser and Microsoft Windows.
By the end of the workshop participants will have:
- Understood what is meant by plagiarism and how and why it may occur
- Viewed and discussed examples of plagiarism
- Seen how the web facilitates plagiarism
- Used online anti-plagiarism tutorials
- Gained experience of using the JISC Plagiarism Detection Service
- Explored other forms of online detection
- Used scenarios to explore pedagogic and administrative approaches to deterring plagiarism
- Shared experiences and views with other trainees
