Is it worth it?

Plagiarism. I realize that practically every student, at somepoint in their academic career, has heard a lecture from a highschool counselor, a middle school English teacher, a historyprofessor or their parents about not plagiarizing.

After a certain point, you become immune. You see SMU’sHonor Code policy in the middle of your syllabus, and your eyesjump to the page with the assignments. You know you’re notgoing to cheat because you’re better than that. You’regoing to plan ahead, read your assignments and start that termpaper early so you don’t feel rushed.

The problem is that you didn’t read your assignments, youcertainly didn’t plan ahead and you definitely started thathuge term paper the night before it’s due. Now you have 10 to12 pages of text to fill and only a blinking cursor to keep youcompany. Instead of sneakily spending the night in the library toresearch your subject of choice, the Internet provides a myriad ofalluring ways out of your all-nighter predicament. I won’twaste your time listing the hundreds of traps that await youruniversity career. You already know where they are.

The thing is, I don’t think you’re planning oncheating. In fact, I have an extraordinarily hard time believingany student with even the tiniest personal code of ethics startsout thinking they’re going to plagiarize. You do it when yourun out of time, when you feel it’s worth $50 spent in anonline store to at least have something to turn in to yourprofessor. You know it’s morally wrong, but the minute youclick ‘Copy’ and ‘Paste’, thatdoesn’t matter. You’ve already done what you neverthought you would do.

In a recent column in the New York Times’ Sunday BookReview section, Suzy Hansen wrote that according to Donald McCabe,the founder of the Center for Academic Integrity at DukeUniversity, 10 percent of college students admitted to Internetplagiarism in 1999, and that number jumped to around 40 percent in2003.

Why do so many students feel comfortable making that consciousdecision? They know it’s wrong. The ethics surrounding theissue have been drilled into them on more than several occasions. Iwould like to assume that most understand how ruining this can beto their academic livelihoods. It’s the feeling of apathy Idon’t understand.

Hansen explained her theory behind the newest unethical trend inher commentary, writing, “The sheer ubiquity of the sites,and what is now almost a lifetime of habitual Internetaccessibility, might explain why the majority of college studentstell McCabe they don’t think copying a sentence or two fromthe Web is a big deal.”

Why isn’t this a big deal? Do students in general nolonger place any value on their own hard work?

My parents’ stressed the value of honesty and hard workevery day. Didn’t your parents stress the same thing to you?I’m sure they never told you it would be OK to plagiarize, totake someone else’s work as your own. Are you botheredyet?

The editors, reporters and columnists who work at The DailyCampus take pride in upholding journalism ethics —telling a fair story from all sides, striving to tell the truth andinforming the public.

Just as important, though, we take pride in putting out thispublication four days a week. We can look at the newspaper in thestands every morning and feel amazed at what we accomplished. Eachtime we see a student reading the paper, we have a strong sense ofownership that comes with working long newspaper hours on top ofheavy course loads. And I take pride in my staff, in their work,their patience and the importance they place on their duty andresponsibility to this paper.

Are these values disappearing from student culture, at large?Are universities really just teaching students how to navigatearound their responsibilities? More importantly, do you reallythink it’s worth it?

Hansen wrote, “What’s actually more amazing is thatstudents would risk their integrity, their education, theirunlimited access to sexual experimentation — all for freeingup 10 measly hours of their already limitless collegetime.”

I just don’t understand what goes through your minds asyou sit there and copy-paste your way into such treacherous waters.What went wrong? I’m pretty sure you didn’t plan to dothis. I’m pretty sure you just want a way out. But why cheat?It’s not worth it.

Emily Powell is a senior journalism major and Editor-in-chiefof The Daily Campus. She can be reached at [email protected].