Do you think it is academic dishonesty to reuse papers you already wrote for a previous class?

[Toriver]

I had a predicament like that once in college. I checked with the professor, and they said that I could use my previous research as a source in the new paper and cite it. So that's what I did: I focused the new paper more closely on the topic of the class and rewrote it, updating the research (the search for knowledge is not stagnant).

 

[trooper6]

That's not what I'm saying, mate. If I originally wrote a paper called "An Argument on the Civil War" and turned it in for a class, and then I didn't change the name OR try to pass it off as new work, and simply say, "Hey, I already know this stuff; I wrote this paper about it back in 2009, it's still relvant and interesting so here you go," why should I be punished for that?

If you ask permission to reuse a paper and your professor gives it to you, then you won't be punished. But otherwise you are in all likelihood breaking your universities policies on Academic Integrity.

And note: I wouldn't give you permission to turn in the same paper twice. If you already know everything you need to know about the topic I'm teaching and there is nothing new for you to learn (which is unlikely), then don't waste your time, my time, or your fellow students time by taking the class--you are taking up a spot that someone else could actually use. And if for some reason you want to take this class but know everything already on the topic, let me know, I can give you more and new material so you do learn something. Unless you know more about the topic than even the instructor. In which case, perhaps you should be teaching the class and not taking it. And you should certainly be presenting your groundbreaking high-level papers at national conferences to the country's top scholars.

 

[silversnake4133]

Well, did you write the whole paper yourself without any outside sources, or did you use sources? If you used sources, then yes it would be considered academic dishonesty because a portion of that writing is based on knowledge you attained from another person's work. Although with how the Code of Ethics is anymore with most universities, they'd consider it cheating by reusing old work just to get out of writing the current assignment. To be safe, I'd just forego on using that old paper and find some new sources. After all, the information you had obtained back then might have been updated.

 

[Silvianoshei]

Well, as one of the folks that teach those 100 level classes, we're going to have to disagree on the BS or lack of BS-ness in those courses. However, the potential for you to obtain something new from the class is always there, even if you are familiar with the subject. Heck, every semester I learn something new in the topic, myself.

"Life is like a sewer. What you get out of it, depends on what you put into it."
- Tom Lehrer from The Remains of Tom Lehrer

With all due respect, I have had 500-level political science classes where I literally learned the same theoretical frameworks that I did in other classes, but with less detail. Some classes are there to teach you something, others are taught by Ph.D candidates and are there to fill out university departmental requirements. I went to Ohio State for my undergrad, 52000 students, so you'll have to pardon my cynicism.

If you strive to bring something new to your students, kudos to you sir. Just know that not all of your colleagues feel the same way. Now that I'm a Ph.D student, I see the sort of thing first hand.

And note: I wouldn't give you permission to turn in the same paper twice. If you already know everything you need to know about the topic I'm teaching and there is nothing new for you to learn (which is unlikely), then don't waste your time, my time, or your fellow students time by taking the class--you are taking up a spot that someone else could actually use. And if for some reason you want to take this class but know everything already on the topic, let me know, I can give you more and new material so you do learn something. Unless you know more about the topic than even the instructor. In which case, perhaps you should be teaching the class and not taking it. And you should certainly be presenting your groundbreaking high-level papers at national conferences to the country's top scholars.

...And if I must take the course to graduate? Even if my paper is not ground-breaking or high-level, if it fits the requirements for the paper guidelines, then why not? I'd rather not take the course and waste a spot BELIEVE ME, I'm with you 100% on that. Also, not all professors are as invested in their students learning experience as you. I've had fantastic professors...and research professors.

 

[KILGAZOR]

The real question is: Is there any way in hell anyone is going to be able to catch you for this? I mean unless you turned your original paper in digitally I doubt there's any chance anyone would know, and even then you may have switched systems in the between time.

 

[davidmc1158_v1legacy]

With all due respect, I have had 500-level political science classes where I literally learned the same theoretical frameworks that I did in other classes, but with less detail. Some classes are there to teach you something, others are taught by Ph.D candidates and are there to fill out university departmental requirements. I went to Ohio State for my undergrad, 52000 students, so you'll have to pardon my cynicism.

If you strive to bring something new to your students, kudos to you sir. Just know that not all of your colleagues feel the same way. Now that I'm a Ph.D student, I see the sort of thing first hand.[/quote]

Well, for the record, I do try to bring new material to the table whenever possible. Sadly, I must also state for the record, I have seen more than a few teachers (at all levels of the education spectrum) that are just taking up space and droning out the textbooks to earn a paycheck.

Oops. My own cynicism came out for a moment.

But, the instructors I always looked up to (and not-so-secretly want to emulate) were the ones that had real enthusiasm for the subject. Personally, I love history. It is fun, exciting, interesting and full of surprises that will mess with your mind.

I have never understood how a history class could possibly be boring when you have such great things to work with!

It saddens my soul when I run into those who can and do make it dull.

As you come into your own Ph.D, I wish to do a shameless bit of begging here: Whatever you do, never let go of the wonder, interest or basic joy you have in the field you are pursuing. Cling to it with tenacity, nurture it with tears of wonderment and never, NEVER let either jaded students or space-wasting faculty take it away from you!

 

[Silvianoshei]

As you come into your own Ph.D, I wish to do a shameless bit of begging here: Whatever you do, never let go of the wonder, interest or basic joy you have in the field you are pursuing. Cling to it with tenacity, nurture it with tears of wonderment and never, NEVER let either jaded students or space-wasting faculty take it away from you!

I will indeed! I'm here to save some lives, and I'm really excited to begin my dissertation next year (effective liver cancer interventions for low-income areas). I'll try not to lose sight, especially considering I'm in this for the long haul (8 years MD/PHD + residency + pediatric oncology fellowship = 15 years, 11 more from this point) so it's really easy to lose sight of the bigger picture or forget the passion you started with. Thanks!

 

[Knusper]

For my GCSE coursework, I reused a murder mystery story I did in 2 years previously, albeit slightly improved. I asked my teacher if I could use it as a "platform to build on" and she said yes, but I found it was good enough as it was and handed in a slightly amended version and got an A*. Back then, I thought it was fair play, but in hindsight, it is cheating.

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

Yeah it's academic dishonesty but who cares? Your professor won't find out and you already put all of the work into it so hell, get your money's worth. I know plenty of students at my school (Rutgers) do it all the time.

 

[caselj01]

If your lecturer or whatever is expecting an original piece of work, and you know this but you deliberately hand in something that is not original, then you are deceiving them and therefore you are being "dishonest". So what you should do is ask them if it is ok to simply re-submit your old paper, that way you are being up front and "honest" about what you are doing.

 

[StargateSpankyHam]

Here's a brilliant idea: Cite your old paper as a source. Yes, write a new one, yes, update it. I'm pretty sure your instructor wants you to write a unique paper for that class - but I'm also pretty sure they'll love it if you reference your own work in a similar (even identical) vein, as part of an ongoing study.

Showing them that you've done the work on the subject beforehand is impressive, only so long as you don't use it as an excuse for getting out of the work.

 

[PatientZero]

It probably is academic dishonesty but its only whether or not that bothers you. I essentially did the same thing for a university paper last year, just changing it from a case study to an essay. If you adapt the old stuff to fit the new question it is technically a different paper and you have answered the question without spending ages looking for new material to write about.

 

[marurder]

If you wrote it I think that it would be okay to use parts but not in a complete copy/paste sense. I would still need the student to add some new content or re-word things so it is appropriate to the question(s) asked. Also I have never seen the exact same question asked twice. Certainly similar questions but never exactly the same. There would be a need to fine tune the article.

 

[Aurgelmir]

Plagiarism is taking something from somewhere else without properly citing it. This includes things that you wrote. In the professional world, if I write an article and publish it, and then write a book...and I want to use stuff from that earlier article I wrote, I have to cite the article. I can't use reuse it without citation. And if I want to use a rewritten version of the original article, I have to get permission from the journal, or no dice. If I don't, the original journal will get really angry...and if they get really, really angry they could block the publication of my book.

Taking an old work and trying to pass it off as a new work...that is really academically dishonest.

You make a lot of good points, I just removed half your text for space

My though was this though:

How can a student cite his own work from a previous class. Most work isn't published, nor is it always available to the new professor.
But let's say that when I was a student I wanted to build upon a previous text I wrote for another class. I want to use the previous text as the basis of the discussion in the new text. I think that will show what you talked about with regards to growth and new thoughts quite well.

My thought is to add the old text as an appendix to my new thesis, would this work?

 

[Jaime_Wolf]

In short: Yes.

It depends on what level you're at, but at higher levels it might be appropriate to reference your previous paper if it's really very relevant. Given that you're being asked to submit the paper for checking, I'm going to guess this is a lower-level course, in which case that would be somewhat odd. Still, it's probably doable, especially if you ask the professor/TA beforehand and give them a copy of the old work with the new one (I would give them the old one outside of the plagiarism checking system since, as you noted, it might come up).

Also, the most blatantly obvious solution: ask the relevant professor. A quick email to them or a TA should clear this up in a few hours if not minutes.

 

[Jedoro]

When was the last time an assignment actually specified that you had to write a "new" work? I sure haven't, and life's all about technicalities. I have to write a paper on subject X using Y amount of sources? Well damn, I did that a few years ago. It's my paper, wasn't ever published, and there was no specification that it had to be completely new. Assignments are about seeing if you're capable of doing something, and I don't see why you shouldn't be able to present evidence that you could do the assignment years ago. If you've learned more, then you're still capable, and doing a new paper just to prove that you can is a waste of time.

Most Universities have Codes of Academic Conduct and Integrity. Not reusing work is on that list of academic dishonesty, so I don't have to put it on every assignment sheet.

For example, here is Tufts University's booklet on Academic Integrity:
http://uss.tufts.edu/studentaffairs/judicialaffairs/Academic%20Integrity.pdf

Pg 9 states: "Never use the same paper twice. It may seem like a legitimate time-saver, but unless you?ve received permission from both instructors to use a single paper in two courses, either may charge you with an academic integrity violation. You may be guilty of this offense even if you make additions or changes in the paper for one of the courses."

Pg. 45 notes that reusing the same paper twice is a a Level 2 violation where the grading consequences are "?Zero? or ?F? on the work without the ability to resubmit it for a replacement grade" or "Automatic course grade consequence of anywhere from one letter grade reduction to ?F?" The disciplinary consequences are "Probation Level II (Transcript nota- tion?expunged after four years)" and "Required meeting with Academic Resource Center"

So, you may think it is fine for you to do this, but if you are at most Universities they don't. You do it in my class, you get a 0 for that assignment and I turn you over to the Dean. Then you are on probation and your academic dishonesty is marked on your transcript.

I've taught at three Universities now and attended another two...all of them have similar policies.
There really is no way for you to "technicality" your way out of that, at least none of the students I've turned over to the dead for that exact same behavior have ever talked their way out of it.

I'm aware that this is a policy at many schools, but the topic is if I believe it should be one or not. I don't, because I think it's silly to prohibit someone from submitting their own work that meets the requirements of an assignment just because they have, are, or will use it for another class as well. No less work was put into writing it, it's just not accepted because it serves more than one purpose. I'm not arguing whether it's legal, I'm arguing whether it's right or not. Also,

at least none of the students I've turned over to the dead for that exact same behavior have ever talked their way out of it.

makes it sound like you killed a student for this.

 

[lRookiel]

I'm pretty puzzled by this myself, I'm told your allowed to use bits of your own work but you must give a reference or it's considered as "Self plagarism".

So if you don't want to spend a few hours writing out a whole new essay, just use bits of your work, reference it and then work around it and you should be fine.

good luck!

 

[Zaik]

No, it's academic dishonesty for your professors to be requesting so many bullshit papers from you that they actually managed to accidentally overlap subjects, and still expect you to believe that you're learning anything other than how to write papers in college.

Use it.

 

[sgtslacker]

I depends on the school and the professor. At my school it is considered plagiarism, unless I get the go ahead from my prof first. most profs tend to be cool with it but some think that it is cheating because you had to do less work than everyone else.