Addressing Student Plagiarism
I'm wondering about the perspective and experience of others here re: how they've addressed situations of student plagiarism? (It seems like a relevant and critical issue to discuss in this particular forum).
One of my first experiences with this was on a Human Behavior Term Paper. As I was reading through a student's paper there was a statement made about the effectiveness of a particular program which contradicted my own understanding of said program's efficacy.
Thinking there might be some "new" or differing research on the matter (after all, the one thing I "know"-as both a Teacher/Instructor and as a person--is that I don't know everything!), I simply cut and pasted the student's work (sic) into a search engine and wouldn't you know it, the VERY FIRST result showed the exact words as written in some other online article/publication! The validity of the statement re: the program's efficacy notwithstanding, the net result is that the student had cut and pasted the entire paragraph from (the) site! I crossed-out the paragraph in her paper and made a note in the margin stating, "These aren't YOUR OWN words! Please see me if you disagree." Academic penalties and University procedures aside, it's probably needless to say the student did not elect to see me about her paper's grade or my comments.
An approach I have since taken when possible in subsequent situations is to take the initiative and either attempt to contact the student or approach them using discretion ("I would like to see you after class") to express my concern and discuss the matter with the student.
What are your experiences with this issue? I realize there may likely be many different scenarios and extenuating circumstances depending on the particular student/situation.
