If the style and writing of the old paper is good enough to get a high grade in the new course, then the student has already learned proper composition.
…I actually had a qualm along these lines about two weeks ago. I wanted to use a relatively obscure fact about a poet for a critique of one of his books. The only place I could find this obscure fact, however, was in an article in my high school literary magazine. Specifically, it was in an article I had written for the literary magazine after attending a reading by and having lunch with said poet.
What did I end up doing?
Citing myself.
I don’t really think that submitting one’s own work is plagiarism. However, I think that the credit one gets for the course is supposed to reflect the work you did for that course, not the work you did for other courses.
If you had interviewed the poet personally, why wouldn’t you just cite the “fact” as part of a “personal interview with the author”? Why the need to cite your high school paper at all?
Again the freshman. The actual goal of a class from the educator’s point of view (them that makes the rules) iseducation. While the student may have the end goal of the grade in mind, them that makes the rules have their eyes on the prize that the student will walk out better educated than when he or she walked in.
But on rereading, it looks like you’ve changed your stance a bit, or I misread from the beginning–reusing a topic (writing a completely new paper, with new research, on something one has written on before) is one thing; recycling a previously written paper is quite another.
There’s no room for improvement?
I’m disturbed by the attitude of some posters, on a message board dedicated to eradicating ignorance, that the ultimate goal is a grade rather than learning or improvement. Sure, some people might do A-level college writing in high school (though I didn’t meet one in 8 years), but even so, that person can refine his or her style through practice. Look at any writer or novelist who’s been publishing for a period of time, and you can see an evolution of style–as an example, Kerouac was “good enough” to get published with The Town and the City, yet between that and On the Road, his writing underwent drastic changes for the (arguably) better.
But apparently, doing the minimum for the grade is all that’s important.
I would like someone to eradicate some of my ignorance. Could you please post a list or link to the colleges who measure this learning improvement?
That is, assess the knowledge or skill in a particular field of each student the first day of class and then judge the student individually on his progress, rather than the level at the end.
As far as the grades, I wholeheartedly agree that the goal of education should be learning or improvement. But it’s not the students who have assigned the grades, it’s the institution and its teachers.
stofsky: IMHO, the point of an education is to produce graduates who are guaranteed to know a certain set of stuff. If I pass a Writing 101 class, I should be able to write at a certain standard level. If I go into Writing 101 with college level writing ability, then I should be able to sleep through it and still get an A, assuming I do the work. If I go in with below highschool-level writing, then I’m going to have to work very hard to improve and reach standard. If I already have good writing skills and want to improve my writing, I should be taking a higher level writing class that matches my skill level.
It appears, FDISK and aahala that we must agree to disagree. You see the goal of a university education to be a degree, and I see said goal to become better educated than when you entered the institution.
The goal of education IMO (not humble) is education, not job placement, NFL drafts, nor anything other than furthering learning. If you’re ahead of the class, you should take the opportunity to move even further ahead. Then again, you could recycle a high school paper and do another keg stand at the frat party.
In following the discussion here, I find that the arguments for or against re-submitting your own work are dictated by ones view on the reason for taking the course in queston. Are you taking the course for self improvement or as a certification of a certain knowledge level: ie. as a prerequisite for another higher level course or some sort of job entrance requirement. If you’re taking the course for personal reasons, then you’re only short-changing yourself by shirking your workload. However, if you’re taking the course merely because you ‘have to’ for work, or to get into another higher level course that you’re truly interested in, then I don’t really see a problem with it.
During my own formal education, I’ve had periods of lackadaisical personal growth where I was picking a choosing courses in which I was truly interested in learning the course material, but I’ve also been inrolled in programs where the entire curriculum is set whether or not you need to learn the material in each and every course. In the latter case, I would’ve had no issues, if I could rehash some personal work to use in a course in which I was already proficient in order to free up some valuable study time for the other courses in which I was struggling.
In a perfect world, you’d be taking classes for the sole purpose of educating yourself. However, in the real world, I’ve found that this is not always the case. I’ve found myself enrolled in several classes that I didn’t want to be in, but were forced upon me by the requirements of the educational ‘system’.
By your schools OWN DEFINITION, copying your own work isn’t plagiarism. It has to be the work of ANOTHER. Point that out to your teacher.
While it wasn’t the university’s policy, I did have more than one professor who included recycling one’s own work in their definition of plagarism. I thought that was quite stupid, but the possiblity to re-use my work never came up, so I didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about it.
<sarcasm>I was so careful not to plagiarize in a couple of cases I didn’t cloud my thinking by reading the books before writing papers on them…funny thing, I got A’s on those papers, in a class I wasn’t techically supposed to be taking as a sophomore (it was supposed to be restricted to seniors) no less :rolleyes:
</sarcasm>
For example, for my GCSE electronics we had two coursework modules, for which we had a design and build something. The requirements were identical. No-one tried to submit the same project twice. It is implicit that you have to do TWO projects.
But if I did, it’s NOT PLAGARISM, it’s just stupid and against the rules! USE A FREAKING DICTIONARY, *****ers!
Yet, if Q1 and Q2 are on my exam (maths) are identical, I’m a moron if I say anything but ‘see Q1’ in answer to Q2
As an amusing aside remember the history exam which reputedly included:
Q
Write an answer appropriate to this exam, and answer it.
A
Write an answer appropriate to this exam, and answer it.
Write an answer appropriate to this exam, and answer it.
(Though, surely, if the question admits this trivial answer it is not appropriate, so only a non-trivial answer is right regardless of the question’s appropriateness.)
Thats great. Ill stick to my school’s definition even if it claims plagiarism involves throwing pancakes at ugly nuns.
Was I unclear? It was directed at professors who redefine plagarism at whim.
And sorry for getting carried away everyone,
Some educational facilities rule that turning in your own previous work is plagiarism. Some rule it’s not, but you can’t do it anyway. Either way, it’s a silly attitude.
Plagiarism applies both in part and to the whole of the text - it is ridiculous to resubmit the exact same piece of work years on(unless of course you are God and made it perfect the first time), and it is likewise ridiculous to rewrite the paper and then submit it so you can avoid plagiarism accusations.
Side note: Universities and colleges do not provide education, they provide * qualifications *.
AotL: I don’t think you need have any qualms about citing yourself. I see authors citing their own work all the time. The research was done; the fact was published; it’s no different from you citing anyone else’s work (or someone else citing yours).
prr: In general, IMHO, it’s preferable to use a citation. Citations are not necessarily used as “proof”, but rather to give interested readers additional resources if they wish to follow up on their own. Presumably, AotL’s original article included some additional context and tidbits that would not really be appropriate to include in the new one, but might be of interest to some readers. By using a citation, motivated readers can easily find the additional material without having to burden the current article with extraneous information.