Plagiarizing an admission essay to an Ivy: what should you do?

I found out someone had plagiarized my college essay to get into an Ivy League school. The girl has already graduated. How should I react to this?

A long time ago I sent my college essays to a relative who asked for them. I didn't realize she would send them to her coworker, whose daughter “edited” my essays and got into Brown. I told her it was plagiarism she insisted my essays were just used as “inspiration.” I found out about this recently.

I was asked to answer this question on the website Quora.com

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Many of the replies from others to this question encourage you to move on. I am going to give you a couple of stories that might help you decide what course of action to take.

First of all, the university I worked at for nearly 30 years has one of the last single sanction honor codes left in the US. A student who is found guilty of violating the honor system via plagiarism is permanently dismissed from the university. There are many students who will not turn in fellow students even if they knew the student had plagiarized because they feel the punishment is too great.

Nevertheless, academic integrity does have significant consequences for those in academia. A professor who plagiarizes research or words from others is publicly shamed and their career is effectively at an end. Jon Ronson’s book So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed depicts how the lives of people have been ruined by the viral nature of media now. One of his case studies focuses on the author Jonah Lehrer, a wonderful writer, who lost virtually everything when another writer found out that he had made up some Bob Dylan quotes for an article. Initially he tried to dismiss the charges before they went public, but the more he tried the worse things got until he was left begging the person not to release the information. The person did release the information and Leher loses everything. Ronson does have some sympathy for the people who made less than grievously harmful mistakes that have since made them feel afraid for their future and in some cases for their lives.

I mention this as it may be that some form of public shaming might occur should you contact Brown and provide them with proof that the person you mention did indeed plagiarize your essays. A few years ago, a student at the university I worked for decided she needed to confess that she had not written her admission essays. She went to the honor committee to tell them since by doing so she thought that this would constitute a conscientious retraction and that although she would be forced to take a year off she would then be permitted to return. The honor committee, however, informed her that she had not committed an honor offense as she was not yet enrolled in the school. They told her she needed to inform the admission office. The student then went to the admission office and informed them she had not written her essays. The admission office decided that the student had not abided by the statement she had signed saying all admission materials were her own work. The action they took was severe to say the least. They not only dismissed her from the university but they said that all work completed was invalid and that there would be no possibility of getting a transcript or any credit for courses completed. In other words, all tuition paid was now wasted as were the years of study. This student lost her education by trying to do the right thing later. This to me seems an egregious error of judgment on the part of the admission office. (None of this was public knowledge but the student came to me for advice. A powerful person at the university persuaded the leadership of the admission office to follow the 1 year policy of the Honor Committee.)

Brown is certainly within their rights to do the same thing to this student. Because of the signature all students submit that asserts that all work is the student’s own, violation of this “contract” means that the student’s admission was granted under false pretenses and that all subsequent work is void. The degree itself would be revoked, so whatever job the student is doing now would likely be terminated as well. Does this sound too severe?

What about this? A student applied for transfer to my university. His grades at a community college were good enough to get accepted. A week before he graduated someone sent in a copy of his transcript from another college he had flunked out of before he enrolled in community college. He had not included this with his application. His transcript at my university was voided. Was this too harsh?

Another student changed grades on his transcript from high school. Should this student be thrown out? If so, there are quite a few students from China currently in the US who have transcripts that have been altered. Should all of them be dismissed?

I do not pretend to have universal answers to these questions. As I stated at the outset, I come from a background where an honor system is a source of pride and the consequences are severe. Looking at the responses you have received it appears that this is perhaps an outdated view of things. Most think you should let it go. I think perhaps you might contact Brown to see what they might do if you choose to inform them about this student. Then you can decide if you want to move forward.

Best of luck with this decision.

Comments:

Nicholas Gagnon

Your answer is the most illuminating I’ve ever read regarding this topic and I will remember to show it to my prof. Regarding to the topic at hand, I am really leaning to let it go. On the one hand, I, as a graduate student myself live ever in fear of the charge of plagiarism (self or otherwise), check and recheck my works multiple times before I submit any things. This is done, while with due respect of academic integrity, to protect myself, my professor as well as my faculty and university. From this point of view, I would say that she should be punished to bring justice to all other students who have done the right things. At the same time, however, I also recognize her age. It was done when she was 18 years old, a rather tender age when one really should be allowed to be foolish. Personally, I only ever learned about self-plagiarism and proper citation at college. Furthermore, many other students, I believe, must have the help of their parents in writing the admission essays. Shouldn’t we also view all of that helps as plagiarism also since they did not submit their own works? If, however, she must be punished, I am hoping that the OP should check out first the severity of such punishment to make sure that it fits the crime. Some of what you recounted are truly harsh and almost illegally torturous.

Parke Muth

Thank you so much for your kind words. I agree that the reaction of some to the plagiarism of an admission essays was too severe. I also agree that most 18 year olds do not know enough about proper citation and quotation. I once had a student in a class I was teaching not cite a quotation and she was the the daughter of a famous English professor. She was clueless rather than full of guile. This both surprised and educated me about what people are taught about writing in high school.

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