College and Plagiarism

Posted on January 12, 2009 
Filed under Uncategorized and tagged ,




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One of my favorite websites, makeuseof.com, is a great resource for anyone looking for the latest Web 2.0 tools and technology available. This week, they listed two interesting sites that sort of cancel each other out. One of those sites, wePapers, is an interactive platform for students that provides searchable student paper databases of study related notes, articles and course work. Students can upload their own papers, or search and browse papers submitted by other users. Any paper on the site can be viewed, printed out or saved to your computer. wePapers also provides a messaging system so students can communicate, ask questions, and work together.

As tempted as I might be, I probably won’t tell my two college-age students about this site. Although chances are, they’re way ahead of me on this one.

I will, however, tell them about the next site mentioned by makeuseof. ThePlagiarismChecker is an online tool that allows anyone to check student papers for plagiarism.  While students can use the site to check their papers for missing citations before submitting them, educators can also use it to check papers for stolen information.

These two sites are interesting and juxtaposed examples of how Web 2.0 has made a huge difference in the world of learning and academia. On the one hand, my college kids have information at their fingertips that I never had access to as a college student, hunched over mountains of printed resources in my college library back in the dark ages. But the reverse is true as well — college professors are able to detect, at the touch of their keyboard, plagiarism and downright laziness. Ah — the information age!

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2 Responses to “College and Plagiarism”

  1.  EABlog on January 25th, 2009 12:25 am

    Thanks for sharing about these resources. The way plagiarizing and not doing one’s own work is getting organized by the web, not to mention becoming easier, is a bit scary for us teachers. I will definitely bookmark both sites.

  2.  nylady on January 27th, 2009 7:00 pm

    Thanks for the comment! You might want to see today’s post about Academic Earth, something that’s actually quite cool.

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