I’m a registered Democrat and a former writing instructor at CU, but Scott McInnis won my vote this week – if he can make it to November, that is.
Any politician who can so masterfully validate the importance of quality English instruction deserves no less. Just imagine the extra zing the year-round English teachers put in their research writing discussions over the last few days. I can see the chalk shrapnel flying from here.
It turns out that Scott McInnis and his “research assistant” Rolly Fischer aren’t much different than many CU students who don’t fully grasp plagiarism. Every semester while students were writing their research projects, I would spend the equivalent of two class periods discussing how to use sources effectively, which included defining the different kinds of plagiarism (accidental and purposeful) and how to avoid them. I’m not saying I did this particularly well, but I did cover the basics.
The egregious cases – the kind where Johnny Student purchases a paper or copies and pastes large chunks from another source – were rare and immediately reported them to the Honor Council. “Accidental plagiarism” – the kind in which Johnny plagiarizes, but doesn’t realize he’s doing so – occurred more frequently.
For these cases, I would sit down with him whether he had received help writing the piece and which sources he had used. Often – and this may be hard to believe – Johnny simply did not understand the basics of source attribution. And so there I’d sit for twenty minutes comparing his paper with the (usually online) document he had become too friendly with, explaining that when you use another writer’s original ideas or language you have to let your readers you’re doing that.
I think the would-be governor is confused as well – why else would he risk so much for something so little as giving credit to a source? Why else would he say “Voters don’t really care about this issue”?
Even Johnny understands that people take plagiarism seriously.
But that’s not to say he cites sources in his working drafts. If you were to eavesdrop on my writing workshops over the years, you would have frequently heard the following conversation:
“Now, Johnny, on this opening page, it seems you are using outside information, but I don’t see any quotes or sources listed,” I’d say.
“Oh, I’ll cite all my sources in the final draft” he’d respond.
“But isn’t that using someone else’s words and ideas as your own – you know, like we talked about?”
(Nervous chuckle from Johnny.)
There’s this “idea” out there that plagiarism isn’t plagiarism till the work goes public. Ladies and gentlemen, if a group of individuals is reading your work, it’s gone public – whether disseminated in a writing workshop or published on a foundation’s website. Stamping “draft” on every page doesn’t change the fact that you’ve led people to believe that the words and ideas of someone else are yours.
I’ll admit it – as a writer, I’m tempted to plagiarize, not so much the specific prose of another, but an insight that I wish were mine. “No one will find out,” I tell myself. And because I’m not a well-known public official, I’m probably right. But then I ask myself, “Is this how I act when no one is looking?” Then I do the right thing. Such a small thing after all.
While there’s no excuse for McInnis and his “research assistant,” I’ll cut students some slack. We’ve failed to teach them how to properly use sources. We’ve failed show them how the appropriate treatment of others” ideas prompts our own original thinking.
Not for nothing have we given the subject short thrift: using sources effectively is a multifaceted skill that demands close attention to fine details, details that, while being important, are about as poetic as an automatic car wash. (“Now, why do I have to put brackets around an ellipsis again?”
Moreover, it’s an advanced research skill, one Johnny should learn after he comes up with an original angle for his paper, but you see Johnny as a general rule struggles with original thinking, so we have to spend extra class time helping him, and guess what gets merely skimmed? And finally, as my former colleague Kathryn Pieplow once mentioned, teaching plagiarism and how to avoid it feels accusatory.
Which is why I hope I’m able to vote for McInnis in November. With him around, English teachers will remember what’s at stake when they stand in front of their students and say, “Now, I’d like to talk a little bit about plagiarism and using sources effectively “
Daniel Brigham (daniel@danielbrigham.com) of Louisville is an educational consultant and communications specialist.
