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Constructing the crisis: Audience perceptions of for-profit education and institutional integrity in the closure of Dana College
No full textFor-profit education is playing an increasingly important role in the educational landscape, with more and more students enrolling in these institutions. However, many within and outside higher education decry the 'corporatisation' of education, fearing that profit motives are beginning to override concerns of institutional and intellectual integrity. This article examines how narratives surrounding for-profit education shape public perception of institutional integrity and how these narratives are co-constructed by their audiences by highlighting as a case study Dana College, a small nonprofit liberal arts college that suspended operations in June 2010 after an unsuccessful attempt to transfer ownership to a for-profit entity. This case study illustrates how failing to account for conflicting, audience-dependent perceptions of educational integrity in an evolving educational landscape can jeopardise the future of higher education
Philosophy in Schools: Then and Now
No full textIt is twelve years since the article you are about to read was published. During that time, the philosophy in schools movement has expanded and diversified in response to curriculum developments (see Cam 1993, 1997, 1998; Kennedy 2013; Sprod 2001; Wartenberg 2009, 2013; Worley 2011), teaching guides (see Cam 1994, 2006; Freakley, Burgh & MacSporran 2008; Goering, Shudak & Wartenberg 2013; McCall 2009; Wilks 1996), web-based resources, dissertations, empirical research (Daniel & Michel 2000; Leckey 2001; Garcia-Moryon, Rebollo & Colom 2005; Reznitskaya 2005; Russell 2002) and theoretical scholarship (Davey Chesters 2012; Hand & Winstanley 2008; Haynes & Murris 2012; Kennedy 2006; Kohan 2014a, 2014b; Lone 2012; Lone & Israeloff 2012; Shapiro 2012; Sprod 2001). Philosophy and philosophy of education journals regularly publish articles and special issues on pre-college philosophy. There are more opportunities for undergraduate and graduate philosophy students to practice and research philosophy for/with children in schools. The Ontario Philosophy Teachers Association (OPTA) (founded in 1999) reports that in English-speaking Canada there are over 28,000 senior high school students studying philosophy in over 440 schools, and philosophy is now a Teachable Qualification (for an overview see Pinto, McDonough & Boyd 2006). In the USA, the Philosophy Learning and Teaching Organization (PLATO) was founded in 2009 to create a network of pre-college philosophy teachers. With the loss of its founders—Matthew Lipman (1922-2010), Ann Margaret Sharp (1942-2010) and Gareth Matthews (1929-2011)—the Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy for Children (IAPC) is developing a digital archive in P4C. My original article was inspired by the design (1999) and pilot (2000) of a new philosophy elective for the Victorian Certificate of Education (VCE). This initiative garnered considerable interest from the P4C community because many believed that (a) the decision to offer a VCE philosophy elective reflected the effectiveness and popularity of P4C in elementary schools, and (b) the new philosophy elective would establish P4C as an essential prerequisite for the study of philosophy in senior secondary school and at university. In my view, enthusiasts overlooked an important difference in the conception of philosophy informing the new philosophy elective: it introduced students to the theoretical or academic discipline of philosophy, whereas P4C conceived of philosophy as a wisdom tradition—otherwise known as the art of living.
A Handy Account of Philosophy in Schools
No full textPhilosophy in Schools is a complex educational practice, unfamiliar to most teachers and philosophers, subtly different to similar forms of education, and so easy to misunderstand and mishandle. Because of this, a common worry for practitioners is whether they are doing it properly. Given this slipperiness of Philosophy in Schools, one of my main concerns has been to give an account that would be useful; that could guide practitioners to teach well. I presented my first account in a 2006 article ‘What is Philosophy in Schools?’ which was based on 14 years’ experience as a Philosophy in Schools teacher and teacher educator. Now, by invitation of the editors, I have the privilege to present a re-worked, improved account. This builds on and synthesises my previous publications, but it also significantly refines anything I have previously written, and is the culmination of my work in Philosophy in Schools
Investigating academic plagiarism: A forensic linguistics approach to plagiarism detection
No full textAutomatic plagiarism detection tools have evolved considerably in recent years. Owing in part to the recent technological developments, which provided more powerful processing capacities, as well as to the research interest that plagiarism detection attracted among computational linguists, results are nowadays more accurate and reliable. However, most of the plagiarism detection systems freely and commercially available are still based on similarity measures, whose algorithms search for similar or, at most, identical strings of text, within a more or less short search distance. Although these methods tend to perform well in detecting literal, verbatim plagiarism, their performance drops when other strategies are used, such as word substitution or reordering. This paper presents the results of a forensic linguistic analysis of real plagiarism cases among higher education students. Comparing the suspect plagiarised strings against the most likely originals from a legal perspective, it is demonstrated that strategies other than literal borrowing are increasingly used to plagiarise. A forensic linguistic explanation of the strategies used and why they represent instances of plagiarism is then offered, and examples are provided to illustrate why existing software fails to detect them. The paper concludes by arguing that commonly used detection software packages can be effective in identifying matching text, but are not necessarily good plagiarism detection systems. More indepth research and improvements in computational linguistics and natural language processing are required to increase the accuracy and reliability of the machinedetection procedure
Turning Points in Narratives of Research Design: Research Innovation Stimulating Unique Responses to Existing Challenges for Beginning Rural Teachers
No full textThis paper explores methodological turning points in researching narratives of early career resilience mediated by the complexities of remote teaching. Innovative, flexible and discursive research design facilitated exploration of emerging narratives using digital technologies. Data were regularly interrogated with participant-researchers to reveal the undercurrents of imbued meaning. Dialogue with participant-researchers enhanced interpretations of data plots and text-based explanations of narrative turning points, providing valuable insights throughout analysis. Reflections on the affordances and tensions in this process illustrate the significance of innovation but also the complexities associated with online collaboration. Consequently, empowering the participant-researchers throughout the life of the research was critical in understanding their narratives of teaching.
Teaching Children to Think for Themselves: From Questioning to Dialogue
No full textThe methods of teaching critical thinking currently favoured are critical analysis and metacognition. The former denies the place of interactive contextual judgment in reasoning, the latter devalues human purposes and quality. A metacognitive lesson on classification is shown to be too didactic to allow children to think in any but a passive sense. Splitter’s categorization of questions shows how moving away from closed substantive questions to open ones through dialogue can encourage children to think for themselves. Some consequences for pedagogy and evaluating children’s thinking are briefly examined
Developing a platform for a culture of honest inquiry and the academic construction of knowledge in first-year students
No full textAcademic misconduct is a concern in tertiary institutes globally with some perceiving it as endemic. Amongst the issues raised by this practice are serious ethical considerations and impacts on learning. If students are not doing their own work, what is actually being learned? The reasons why students plagiarise are therefore a legitimate area of study and may not be as straightforward as they first appear. This research was conducted at the Petroleum Institute (PI), an engineering university and research institute in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
The main objective of the research was to gather data which would highlight the perceptions first-year students have concerning the proportion and frequency of cheating among their peers. There was also interest in discovering what students considered to be the main reasons for such behaviour. Findings show that at the start of the undergraduate programme, three quarters to four fifths of the students viewed copying as serious or very serious. However, after only one semester this percentage had dropped considerably for some areas. Frequency of cheating also varied from the first to the second semester. The data established that there is a clear problem and indicates a need for change. In the context of the Communications Department, to which the researchers belong, courses were already in place within which issues of plagiarism and copying were minimal.
This paper presents the full findings of the investigation and describes an enquirybased approach adopted by the PI Communications Department in 2006 to lay the foundations for developing honest inquiry and the academic construction of knowledge. The approach aims to facilitate student engagement, ownership and buyin and has had a mitigating effect on copying and plagiarism. Recommendations are suggested for general changes across the curriculum, based on the experiences of the above mentioned programme
Editorial 9(1)
No full textWelcome to Volume 9(1) of the International Journal for Educational Integrity. This issue is being published just a few months after the International Center for Academic Integrity's Annual Conference in San Antonio, and directly before the Plagiarism Across Europe and Beyond Conference opens in Brno, Czech Republic. Further research and good practice will be shared at the 6th Asia Pacific Conference on Educational Integrity, in Sydney, 2-4 October 2013. It is evident from the increasing depth and maturity of research output that academic integrity as a field of inquiry is well established.
This expanded issue is presented thematically, beginning with articles that explore how academic integrity is understood by under graduate and international students,through to papers that report how postgraduate research students develop writing and academic skills, then to an overview of systems for detecting plagiarism when itoccurs, and finally a paper which reports on an initiative which aimed to change institutional practices and build a culture of integrity.
Mike Joy and UK colleagues build on their previous research by investigating computing students' understandings of source-code plagiarism via their responses to a series of scenarios. Based on data from 770 students representing 21 higher education institutions, mostly in Europe, Joy et al. not only detail findings which will bevaluable for institutional policy and practice, but provide useful scenarios which can be adapted and used as educational resources. Not surprisingly, a key finding from this work is that "certain types of plagiaristic activity are poorly understood".
Stella-Maris Orim and her colleagues from the Impact of Policies for Plagiarism in Higher Education Across Europe Project (led by Irene Glendinning) at Coventry University, use a different approach to explore Nigerian postgraduate students' understandings of plagiarism as they negotiate their new educational environment in the UK. Based on interview data from 18 Nigerian postgraduate students, the authors use the phenomenographic method to develop six categories relating to this student group's understanding of plagiarism. The authors conclude that "Nigerian postgraduate students have an inadequate understanding of plagiarism from their previous institutions".
Michelle Vieyra, Denise Strickland and Briana Timmerman extend work previously published in the IJEI by Gilmore et al. (2010). Vieyra and colleagues report on patterns of plagiarised material in science and engineering master's and doctoral theses "in the hope that it will contribute to the growing awareness of the problem of plagiarism in graduate schools as well as provide insight into the causes ofplagiarism". Plagiarised text was found in 28% of the proposals, and in agreement with other research described in this issue, the authors conclude that the plagiarism occurred as a result of lack of familiarity with the requirements of academic writing and conventions.
Moving from understanding and preventing plagiarism, US researchers Norman Meuschke and Bela Gipp provide a comprehensive review of plagiarism detection systems with the aim of finding an "approach which automatically detects morestrongly disguised plagiarism, such as paraphrases, translations or idea plagiarism" rather than the more easily identified character-based text comparisons. Having explored the advantages and disadvantages of a range of detection approaches, the authors conclude that to be able to reliably detect paraphrases, translated plagiarism and idea plagiarism requires a novel method, which may need to incorporate crosslingual,citation-based, and intrinsic plagiarism detection approaches.
Andrew Garner and Larry Hubbell, from the University of Wyoming, use the case study method to identify three models employed in US colleges and universities toadjudicate academic integrity breaches, specifically plagiarism: the 'student-centered' model, the 'due process' model and the defacto 'classroom manager' model. The authors demonstrate how each of these models provides different incentives tostudents regarding their likelihood to engage in plagiarism, and to staff in terms ofhow they respond to such academic integrity breaches.
The final paper brings together the key issues of inquiry in this field, and demonstrates what is arguably the key ingredient for preventing breaches ofacademic integrity: developing and nurturing a culture of integrity. The initiative reported by Patrick Baughan at City University, London aimed to promote better understanding of academic conduct issues amongst staff and students and generate institution-wide culture change. Based on phenomenographic analysis of interviews with eight change agents, known as Educational Development Associates, the author concludes that consideration of cultures and practices in departmental/programme contexts needs to complement central planning approaches to change initiatives.
I trust you will enjoy the range of topics explored in this issue. Volume 9(2) will publish the best papers from the Plagiarism Across Europe and Beyond Conference, together with regular reviewed submissions. I welcome feedback via email:[email protected]
Tracey Bretag, Editor, International Journal for Educational Integrit
Institutional models for adjudicating plagiarism in the United States
No full textThere is considerable variation in how colleges and universities across the United States adjudicate plagiarism. This article formulates three separate models that reflect differing administrative approaches in these institutions and discusses how each model alters the incentive structures for both students and faculty when it comes to preventing and mediating instances of academic dishonesty. Among highly selective private liberal arts colleges, the authors find that many schools employ a 'student-centered' model that allows students control over much of the decisionmaking process. In contrast, many larger universities and public institutions engage in a more litigation-averse'due process' model where faculty and administration are the primary decision-makers. Finally, the authors consider the presence of a potential de facto 'classroom manager' model where adjudication of academic dishonesty is handled primarily by the professor outside of any independent institutional process. These models reflect general typologies reflecting different institutional and organisational cultures that can lead to different incentive structures for faculty and students when confronted with instances of academic dishonesty