What Would You Do Wednesday: Scenario 6

Each week we will bring you a short scenario to address issues that you, your colleagues and students might face. How would you respond to these scenarios? Would you file a report, or do something different? Talk to your colleagues about these situations - the classroom should be a safe learning environment for students AND instructors!

SCENARIO #5

It’s the end of the quarter! You have just finished teaching a section of a history course for the first time. It’s an area of history that you really love, and the students in the class really appreciated your enthusiasm for the subject. The papers that they wrote were so good! You know that you have inspired them, and it shows in the quality of their papers. Now, however, you have a huge stack of grading to do!

As you begin reading through the paper of one of your favorite students, you start to think that things sound familiar. Sure enough, when you google one of the paragraphs, it turns out that the student has plagiarized sections of a paper by an author whose work can be found online. Your favorite student! Those papers were always so good! You begin to wonder if this student’s previous papers also had parts that were plagiarized. What should you do?

Post your comments below!

If you'd like someone from the 5 Star Consortium to follow up with you regarding this scenario, please email fivestarcolleges@gmail.com