42 Responding to plagiarism
How did you (help your TAs to) respond to plagiarism? What are the procedures at the course, department, faculty level?
EG: I encountered an egregious plagiarism case during my teaching fellowship; the student lifted full sentences from multiple (unassigned) secondary sources and borrowed heavily from lecture. I reached out to the Academic Integrity Office before proceeding, and they guided me through the steps. After emailing the TA and asking them to hold off on releasing any grades to the student, I met with the student to present evidence and discuss the problem (they admitted to plagiarizing). I then emailed AIO with a summary of the case and was informed that this is a first offence, so I issued the “first offence letter” (on AIO’s website) to the student, copying the associate dean. In first offence cases like this, the instructor determines the appropriate penalty (e.g., a grade of zero), so be prepared for that as well as for the student’s right to appeal. AIO offers a full checklist and templates for all documents/correspondence here.
ES: I’ve only ever dealt with very minimal cases of plagiarism, in which the student did not cite their references correctly, or mistakenly used quotations so that it looked like someone else’s words were their work. In those instances, I haven’t used the Academic Integrity Office — I just emailed the student, informed them of their mistakes, and let them know that, although this is technically a case of plagiarism, I would not be penalizing them through the AIO, although I would be docking marks.