Comments on: Fighting cheating, one baseball cap at a time

By: Deterrents don’t deter « Rowin’s Blog

Deterrents don’t deter « Rowin’s Blog — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 13:19:38 +0000

[…] the assumption that plagiarism only occurs through a deliberate desire to cheat, and as I’ve argued before, positions all students as potential cheats rather than as developing academics who may be […]

By: Rowin’s blog » Is there anybody there?

Rowin’s blog » Is there anybody there? — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 09:53:20 +0000

[…] as with ‘presumption of guilt’ approaches to plagiarism, attendance requirements and penalties for absence are based on the assumption that students are […]

By: Paul Richardson

Paul Richardson — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 09:43:11 +0000

Hi Rowin,
Interesting post. I think this runs in parallel to many issues in the ‘security’ domain, wherein purely technical solutions are never sufficient, and it is dangerous to rely on them as a sole strategy. Services like Turnitin are a bit like a spellchecker – the squiggly underlines are convenient, but no substitute for being able to spell. The equivalent of ‘being able to spell’ in this case is for teachers to be skilled at setting appropriate assessment tasks, and recognising when answers feel like they may be pasted direct from somewhere.
However, what I think is most important is the way this relates to institutional culture, as I think you imply here. Students should ‘buy in’ to policies adopted by the institution. Most students have a strong vested interest in feeling secure in the knowledge that others are not cheating, so should be happy to engage with this agenda. In contrast a ‘paranoid approach to student integrity’ is clearly likely to alienate students. Thanks for a thought-provoking posting…