Dilemna
I have a professor who has accused me of plagarizing a paper. Have any of you ever been accused of something like this before? It urks me. I copied, pasted, and reworded as well as cited the source. I made it my own. He is saying that I used direct quotes in the paper. No, I didn't. I am so fed up with it that I sent him proof that it wasn't plagarized and that he should never assume with anyone, but question him or her first. I sent it to the VP of Academic Affairs and the prof. Please pray my grade is changed to what I really do deserve because I worked on it for 2 weeks, and I don't just throw anything together because for me it requires a lot of thought before writing. Thank you. Here is what I wrote to get them off my back. Here is your poof that I did not plagarize.Reminder every paragraph is cited, and I did use my own words.Example from article- "Scientific racism emerged at the same time-the latter half of the nineteenth century through the early twentieth century-and maintained that essential biological differences among the peoples of the world were the root cause for cultural differences, including religion. The boundaries of biological difference, according to scientific racists, should not be crossed. If they were, it would be to the detriment of all. Nonwhite people could not assimilate into American culture by conversion to Christianity because assimilation could only take place at the level of biology-that is, only by racial intermarriage" ( Protestant Missionaries, Asian Immigrants, and Ideologies of Race in America, 1850-1924 Lisa Joy Pruitt. The Journal of American History. Bloomington:Dec 2007. Vol. 94, Iss. 3, p. 948-949 (2 pp.).. That is a direct quote. Notice I even cited the source. What I wrote- Scientific racism emerged at the same time-the latter half of the nineteenth century through the early twentieth century-and maintained that essential biological differences among the peoples of the world were the root cause for cultural differences, which included religion (Modern and Postmodern mindset). The boundaries of biological difference, according to scientific racists, are to not be crossed. If they were, then it would be to the loss of all. Nonwhite people could not assimilate into American culture by conversion to Christianity (Christian Theism) because absorption could only take place at the level of biology, which is by racial intermarriage (Worldview; Postmodern mindset).[5] This is not. Notice the citation at the end, and me changing it to my own words to make it my own as well as following your instructions. Do these look like direct quotes to you? No, they are not. In fact, it is all paraphrased as I have stressed to you earlier. I made it my own work, and did not use direct quotes. If I used direct quotes, then you would have known, but I didn't. I chose to paraphrase because that is what most professors want, but I made it my own. I covered myself by citing the source at the end as well. I hope you now see what I am saying because this is ridiculous. I followed your instructions very clear, and this is seriously how I write. I seriously write A papers, and this is my work. If you want examples of other papers I have written, you are welcome to that as well. It tooke me 2 weeks to do this, and it shows, but has everything to do with social justice. I don't just throw something together. I have to put a lot of thought into how to put it together to make it good, and this is what I came up with. Your instructions were not very clear on how to write the article, so I did my own research and combined two authors, paraphrased it, and made it my own. I did the best that I could with the instructions you gave. I would suggest that next time ask questions before assuming anything, and giving examples to your students of what you want exactly, so that there is no questioning on what is expected. Thank you, Elizabeth Lord
Replies
that happened to my son recently and he had to redo his whole paper. hang in there. there is a website that you can use to check your paper for plagerism. my brother in law uses it a lot, but i think his college has an account there. sorry that happened to you and prayers that your grade will not suffer!
I would use the following as a guide to writing papers. It was something I was told in graduate school. When doing a paper use as many sources as you can. To use the idea of one person and having it be considered plagiarism is far greater than if you use the ideas of many which can be considered research. I hope this all gets worked out for you.
Fight for what you believe is right and I will keep you in prayer. I\'ve never had to deal with this type of problem, but I do agree with the others who did comment and have direct contact with this issue. I really enjoyed the one from Jleemurpa which makes alot of sense and I will try to remember that for future reference. i wonder what is the name of that website that you can check for plagarism--so put this note on your notebook for future reference also.
will be praying for you same way with capricorn7 hopefully and in prayer that you will get the grade that you deserve here if you ever need to talk