I'm American, but I went to Oxford, and have traveled the isles and generally enjoyed the place. My fiance and I are looking into moving there once we marry. It's refreshingly un-American. What part of the UK are you from?

-T.

Can you please start failing people on JoeUser?

lol amen...

And yes, I agree, it's only right that you failed her.

~Dan

Angloesque--
It's tough not not sympathize with somebody when they are in a bad situation, it's hard to keep a level head and to know what is right in general and what is right for them. It's tough to have empathy but no sympathy. It's the difference between keeping somebody from making mistakes and facing the consequences and by doing so, keeping them from succeeding; verses allowing them the chance to fail, therein allowing them the chance to eventually succeed. You did what was right for her, and if she is wise, it will help her down the line. : )

*sniffles and gets expelled 'cuz dean Wardell kicked him out*

Can someone clarify if it actually is so difficult to write their own 'original' material? I've never had that problem and it baffles me that people would plagarize short of being lazy..

Peter,
please save me the crap. I have seen numerous British students plagiarise. There is a very serious problem in one if the UK's top universities with this at the moment. Almost half an entire class is under threat of expulsion. But don't worry, I'm sure their rich aristocratic parents can offer the university enough cash to brush the problem under the carpet. Standard British solution to the problem. Plagiarism, what plagiarism? Luckily many of the local companies have signed a petition stating that they will refuse to accept graduates from that university unless the university deals with this issue seriously.

Paul.

I'm for any punishment that offers no opportunity for redemption. Hell, why not just break all her fingers too? God damn cheaters. Everyone in the class should get to beat her with their bookbags for an hour or you could make her into the class spitoon for a week.

Seriously, though, I remember teachers like this and the only lesson I learned was to cheat smarter. It took other teachers later in life a lot of effort to convince me that I was only cheating myself. In other words, they weren't lazy (like you) and taught me integrity and self-worth as well as the coursework.

Oh, and don't get me wrong - they punished me as well, but that was unavoidable and not vindictive (like you).

Matt's right. College students are only children (even though they aren't). They know not what they do.

It's also funny how you blame others for your dishonest actions Matt. It's a shame nobody ever taught you accountability for your own actions.

SuperBaby, I didn't blame anyone else for my actions. Also, if you read what I wrote it's plain that I learned accountability, responsability, integrity, duty and so on.

As a teacher - a teacher - I expect one thing. Teaching. And I've met far too many teachers who power trip first and teach a distant second.

Ask yourself if you've done anything to help that cheating student, or if you've just scored an easy vengeance on a helpless target. There are plenty of ways you can punish for wrongdoing that are object lessons (trust me, I know) and will result in a punished (accountable) student as well as an educated one.

For cheating you want to expell from school? Is that really the best you can come up with?

1) Maybe rather than blame teachers for not teaching children (in college) integrity and honesty, maybe you should blame your own parents. They're the ones who are supposed to teach their children integrity and honesty. Too many people want others to raise their children and then they wonder why their children end up so screwed up?
2) I never knew students who plagiarized were helpless and had no other alternative, like doing the work (even on the night before its due) or not doing it and just suffering one bad grade. I guess I should have plagiarized so that people would pity me. Instead, I just didn't do the work for that one assignment (or did it but really half-ass) and still got an A.
3) Let's see. You expect a teacher to teach. This English teacher teaches English as it is an English class, and you see something wrong with that? Is every college course supposed to spend half the time teaching students about honest and integrity lest the students didn't learn about it from their parents when they were children?
4) If college students really are expected to be as naive and ignorant of the world as you make them out to be, maybe we need to raise the age of adulthood to 30.
5) If I were to steal from my company, would they be wrong in firing me on the spot even if they didn't teach me about honesty and integrity in the workplace because they expected me to learn it from elsewhere (which I might have, except I didn't listen in the first place because I wasn't taught how to listen by all my professors at Yale).

1. I'd rather not blame at all. Unlike you, I've proposed an alternative to the original problem, catching someone for plagiarism. I think setting a task or punishment for the student that will both educate as well as reprimand.
2. When you're done yapping from your high horse, come on down here where everyone makes mistakes, and it's possible to throw the bathwater out without tossing the baby.
3. Try to remember that teachers are human beings, not machines. I said I -expect- teaching from them, but that doesn't mean that nothing else can come from them. In fact, it's impossible to avoid many lessons that occur naturally in the teacher-student interaction. Lessons like "I'm the boss and you're my little bitch" -OR- "I respect you because you respect me."
4. You are comparing school with work. There is no point in addressing this straw man argument.

Baby, I figure you're just feeling extra hot-n-bothered by being on the internet, but you'd be better off spending your vitriol on more positive endeavors. Really.

Oops, I messed up the numbers there. Well, you'll figure it out.

Unless by making this mistake you now think I should be banned from writing on the forums. *giggle*

Matt,

sounds to me like you'd rather blame Angloesque for setting a specific disciplinary action. I presume that it was made clear to the students before papers were assigned that "Plagiarism = F". That is a simple, easy-to-understand, well-stated punishment for plagiarism.
I don't know if "Plagiarism on Paper X = F on X" or "Plagiarism on any paper = F for course". The first should be more to your liking, since it offers the possibility that one's grades on other papers may carry them successfully through the course. The fact that for this student, "F = violates academic conditions for continued enrollment" is unfortunate, to be sure. However, laying out consequences for plagiarism, and then carrying through on the consequences, does teach an important lesson: actions have consequences. And that sounds like a lesson this student was (and may still be) in need of learning.

It's clear from the tone of her post that Angloesque did not want to cause the student's expulsion, and that it was an undesirable side effect of assigning the failing grade. You need to get off your own high horse; there's a clear difference between making a mistake and getting caught cheating.

Matt, you accuse Super Baby of being on a high-horse when you call Angloesque "lazy" because they didn't try to 'rehabilitate' the student. This poor unfortunate student is in for alot more trouble than just plagarism, as Angloesque mentioned..But the professors should accept this kind of behavior? Jeebus, what a landslide in society in general!
Angloesque, powertrip away. Some people deserve it beyond compare.

You know the rules..you break them, you get punished. How isn't it that simple?

I simply can't believe it is okay to willingly break a rule and whine when you get caught and punished for it.. That's outrageous.