Today I discovered a student who blatantly plagiarized something off the Internet and turned it in as his* own. According to my policy, I am supposed to fail him. This is the first time any student has plagiarized in a class from me, that I know of; and he's a good kid: smart, funny, though not a regular attendee by any means. I don't want to fail him but I promised I would at the beginning of class.
And it's not like he didn't know my policy; it's there on the syllabus and I've referred to it several times throughout the quarter. Zero tolerance. I hate plagiarism and, as my boss says, there's something to be said about educational Darwinism, but still--is this the best way to deal with it?
On the other hand, and along a deeper vein, I think colleges are full of students who no one ever says "No" to. There are students in my class who shouldn't have been allowed into it, students whose English skills are so poor they could probably learn stuff in a second-grade class and my class is above their heads. These kinds of people make it through: am I doing a good thing by stopping that, or am I without compassion? Should I pass some of the ones with Fs by giving them D-minuses just to move them along? They're just lazy; they're not dumb.
I honestly like them, but that doesn't mean I should pass them.
Why why why why why do people plagiarize? It doesn't help them. It doesn't make the world better. And selfishly, I don't want to make another person feel badly, even though I logically know it's not my fault; it's his.
(*Aside: The English language needs more neuter/non-gender-specific words! The student might be male or female; feminism forces me to allow for both sides.)