Are university degrees now worthless?

[Smithster 10]

Serious question...

 

Whie researching something on the internet recently, I came across a number of websites which enable student5s to download ready-made essays on any subject you care to mention. All one needs to do is change a few words, make sure you have read the essay so any questioning from your tutor will stand up to scrutiny, and hey presto - you can gain a degree without ever having to write an essay.

 

So does this completely devalue a genuine degree?

[Kaizabella 10]

A lot of universities are aware of this practice and its classed as plagerism (sp?) so they'll automatically fail the assignment is they use the ready made essays.

[steve_magoo 10]

Universities are pretty hot on plagiarism nowadays. They have software put in place to detect it, which includes a back catalogue of hundreds of thousands of past essays. The only way to get a degree using other peoples work is to get essays specifically made for you and these can cost hundreds of pounds each. The sensible thing to do would be to learn the course, perhaps spend the money on a tutor and avoid the risk of being kicked out of university.

 

Degrees would be worthless if everyone was doing this, but then again you could make a fortune putting your degree into practice by writing essays for lazy students. With so few people doing this and with the likelihood of getting caught being so high, it doesn’t seem like university degrees are worthless. It’s just the case that a small percentage of students are worthless…

[Smithster 10]

A lot of universities are aware of this practice and its classed as plagerism (sp?) so they'll automatically fail the assignment is they use the ready made essays.

 

Yeah that I understand, but surely it would be entirely dependent on the people doing the marking having read every single one of the essays available on the web to make a comparison, otherwise how are they going to know?

[Kaizabella 10]

might not be of THAT much use, but try this thread:

 

http://www.sheffieldforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=470806&highlight=essays

[pinklilbean 10]

Yeah that I understand, but surely it would be entirely dependent on the people doing the marking having read every single one of the essays available on the web to make a comparison, otherwise how are they going to know?

 

My friend who studied at Sheffield Uni had to submit a hard copy and an electronic copy of any assignments, which then got scanned by a programme, and they got a percentage at the end of it (to see how much was or wasn't copied).

 

My mum teaches evening class and works with distance learners. She has one student print work directly off the internet, which included the URL address at the bottom needless to say she refused to mark it!!

[HarmOKnee 10]

A lot of universities use Turn It In Originality Check for assignment submissions, which searches the internet for comparisons, tutors don't need to do it.

[Smithster 10]

My mum teaches evening class and works with distance learners. She has one student print work directly off the internet, which included the URL address at the bottom needless to say she refused to mark it!!

 

 

Isn't that akin to writing some graffiti and then adding your name and address at the bottom? Idiots!

 

Fair points from everyone else though. I didn't realise that these software packages existed to combat this

[pinklilbean 10]

 

Isn't that akin to writing some graffiti and then adding your name and address at the bottom? Idiots!

 

Yep! She did even say to him, "and you're sure this is your work??" and he agreed. Lol! He did eventually own up to it not being his, like she didn't know.

 

Another student, who mum had met a couple of times did a classic. He was studying GCSE Human Biology. She'd had a couple of pieces of work from him, which weren't of a great standard.

 

And then all of a sudden for the piece that was being submitted, he produced this amazing piece of work. Really thorough, pretty much perfect, using degree level terminology etc.

 

My mum was a little bit... Suspect of this work as the previous work had been quite basic. She also noticed the owner of the word programme, was a female, which obviously might have been innocent but here's the rest of the story...

 

Anyway, she said to me, I might know him (he was at my school, in the year above me). I did know of him. I also knew his girlfriend, who is currently at medical school. That would be the name of the person who word was registered to, and also the person he'd got to write his work!!

 

I guess it was just unlucky coinsidence for him!!

[HarmOKnee 10]

 

Isn't that akin to writing some graffiti and then adding your name and address at the bottom? Idiots!

 

Fair points from everyone else though. I didn't realise that these software packages existed to combat this

 

University lecturers are not as daft as they look

[Jessica23 10]

Fair points from everyone else though. I didn't realise that these software packages existed to combat this

 

Even departments that don't have the software are alert for plagiarism. It's usually fairly easy to detect, since only the stupid students think it's a good idea and when they nick a well-written sentence from elsewhere it jumps off their poorly-presented page.

 

Google is the first port of call for suspicious work - just googling a phrase will often throw up the source, especially via Google books.

[Smithster 10]

Google is the first port of call for suspicious work - just googling a phrase will often throw up the source, especially via Google books.

 

Yeah that's fair enough. But I'm sure one of the sites I saw (can't find the link now) had pages and pages of links to documents in PDF format. I'm pretty sure that Google is not capable of searching the content of these.