News | Sunday, 19 July 2009

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Sixty students accused of plagiarism since 2006

James Debono
The University of Malta will resort to a controversial American software programme, which sources an archive of millions of academic papers and students’ assignments from all over the world to catch out plagiarists.
Education Minister Dolores Cristina revealed in parliament that since 2006, 60 students were brought before the university’s examination disciplinary board, accused of plagiarising assignments from the internet.
Of the 27 students accused of plagiarism in 2008, only five were absolved. Another 23 were accused of plagiarism in the first six months of 2009.
Cristina said the university will now be equipped with new software – Turnitin – that detects plagiarism from the internet, by comparing papers and essays from a database of over 22 million papers, and archived journals.
However, the essays submitted will also be storied inside the Turnitin database to prevent the use of one student’s paper by another student and identify any matching text between papers.
This has raised concern about the storing of students’ assignments in the company’s databases and whether this violates copyright laws. Two American students from McLean High have even launched a court challenge against Turnitin, claiming the anti-plagiarism service violates copyright laws by allowing a private company to use student papers for profit making. They demanded $900,000 in compensation for the alleged breach.
Robert A. Vanderhye, the attorney representing the students, argued that Turnitin violated the right that students have to be in control of their own property.
But the archiving of student papers by Turnitin was deemed a fair use by US courts, because student papers are not used for any other purpose than preventing plagiarism.
The problem of plagiarism from the internet in Malta was first raised in 2005 by former pro-rector and present university ombudsman Charles Farrugia, who appealed to all lecturers who feel “plagued by plagiarism” to share their experiences before university decides on the plan of action.
Farrugia recounted what he described “the most ludicrous case of plagiarism” he ever encountered in an interview with MaltaToday. “I had this student who was accused of plagiarising his thesis. We faced him with the charge; we told him ‘you’ve copied all your thesis, word for word’. His answer was: ‘Why did you bring me here? That thesis was too good, I couldn’t write anything better’.”

jdebono@mediatoday.com.mt

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