Plagiarism in School Assignment in Thailand, How should I work with it?

Proud Arunrangsiwed

This is Proud Arunrangsiwed. I am a Thai university lecturer. The time that I write this post is November, 2018. I do not have much time to write my blogs recently. Most of the time of mine has been devoted for my students and research studies. Although my university needs a ton of research papers to improve its university ranking, but I cannot just sit and write my papers without taking care of my students. I have spent many hours a week to work with my students’ thesis and the correct their assignment. I might not one of a few lecturers that assign the individual projects and homework for the students to do. We all know that to assign individual projects, teachers have to spent a large amount of time on reviewing, talking, and correcting students’ work. I could do it. I mean, I will do it, because I feel that it is a right thing to do so. I think the students will be benefited by working in their individual project better than the group work.

I have noticed many other university lecturers. Many of them assigned the group work, and most of these works are about to write a whole book to report some project. Like, the whole semester, each group of students have to submit only one assignment, which is this thick book. These lecturers would grade the students based on only this book, class attendance, and the exams. There are no other homework assignments. Some said that these teachers are lazy. However, I would rather say that I am too diligent.

Let’s talk about the big-book assignment that most teachers ask most students to complete it at the end of the semester. Almost all of these books contained too much copyright infringement. Undergraduate students are likely to copy the contents from any website that they could find the related information regarding their topics. I am too tired to see this kind of students’ work.

First, I feel like they do not show the respect toward their teachers, because they think that their teachers are stupid and do not know that they copy the work of someone else.

Second, I feel like these students are brainless, because they could not create any work by themselves. I think it is a good thing to look around many information in the internet, but they should read and write them in their own words, not just copy and paste.

Third, I think it is not fair for other students who create the work by themselves. I guess that some teachers may not know how to check the plagiarism without using Turn-it-in. The grading will not be fair for the students who work very hard, compared to those who just copy and paste things from the internet.

Figure 1: Thai classroom

One of my friends who is the teacher in the school of management told me something about her students. She told me that she tried to blame and teach the students who like to copy and paste online information to put in their project book. You know what? Her students said that she (the teacher) was stupid because she did know the benefit of the internet where was the place for students to copy the text. This is a kind of panic, I think. I do not understand why her students think this way.

Once, I discover the fact that some other teachers also teach their students to copy things around the internet. I have been in a communication or media art program. In some class, the students need to go outside to take the photos and shoot the videos. However, one of my friend in the same school encouraged his students to copy any pictures and videos from websites and paste in their work.

I think, the educational institutes should do something with this kind of teachers. They should have a seminar or workshop or intervention to teach them to be a better teacher. Moreover the university and high school should have more strict rules to punish students who do the copyright infringement and plagiarism.

This blog is written by Proud Arunrangsiwed, a Thai animation teacher.