# Plagiarism in a group paper



## Sun Lips (Jan 28, 2013)

In a Management class I took this semester, our final paper was due today. I was the "group leader" for a group paper we were assigned. Over the past week, I've received all the sections of the paper we divvied up, and I edited them into one document. Not just cut and paste, either - I read through everything and edited for consistency, checked that all sources were legitimate and that the citations were correct, and ran material through Google to check for plagiarism. Everything checked out.

This is a class that is entirely online, so I submitted it through the class site, which involves a check on Turnitin.com. Turnitin gives you an "originality report," which I checked. It reported that the material in the paper was 33% consistent with material in other papers/sources known to Turnitin.

Looking at the report, I can see that most of the "matches" are from the References page, which is normal, and properly cited quotes, which is also normal. But then I saw that 8% of the total paper is highlighted in red, indicating a 75-100% match. The source this material was "matched" to was another paper turned in at my school. I can't access that paper so I can't tell how similar everything actually is.

All of this apparently plagiarized material is concentrated to one section of the paper, which I have documented as being assigned to one group member. It is visible on the class forum that this person took responsibility for this portion of the paper. The rest of the paper contains no indication of actual plagiarism, but huge chunks of this one person's contribution are marked.

I have already turned the paper in. There was no way I could have detected this plagiarism before submitting it, as another document submitted to my school isn't going to show up on Google search. It's just in the Turnitin database, which I don't have access to (and you can't use Turnitin as a student to make sure your paper is clear or anything like that.)

I messaged my group members, letting them know the situation. I insisted that anyone with information about it should come forward, but I doubt they will.

So I also messaged my professor. I wanted documentation that I brought this issue to her attention, and I want to protect the other group members (including myself) because there was no other plagiarism in the paper. I know it's not uncommon for the entire group to go down in situations like this, so I'm panicking a bit.

Now I have contacted the group about it, as well as the professor. At first, I was going to wait and see if the professor even said anything, but that left a bad taste in my mouth. I figured I should be the one to bring it to her attention.

I know I really need to wait for her to get back to me, but is there anything else I should be doing? Am I going about this right? Do you think the chances are significant of my entire group being penalized for this, especially if I identified it as soon as I could and can prove that the plagiarized material was submitted by one person?

Ugh...


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## NighTi (Jan 1, 2013)

You did exactly the right thing. I would stop worrying about it.

Plagiarism is making a false authorship claim. You're doing exactly the opposite. You're explicitly and openly distancing yourself from any such claims. Your story shows that you even went the extra mile to ensure the integrity of your submission. You did your institution proud.

Understand that there may still be consequences that arise from the logistics of the situation. Your professor is now faced with a mess that she needs to untangle. There is no question about your own academic integrity, but she now has the unpleasant task of sorting through the paper and assigning grades. If I were in your spot, I would let her decide how to manage the process and trust that she will do so in a just and fair way. If she doesn't, the system has plenty of checks and balances to protect you. The issue may take a while to get sorted out, but you'll be fine.


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## anarchitektur (Feb 11, 2011)

I think your approach has been pretty level-headed and reasonable. Were I in your place, I'd probably be water-boarding my team members until I got a confession.


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## Siggy (May 25, 2009)

I wonder if the person in your group turned in the other paper as well. I mean the person could have copied something from another paper and put it in this one

Just an idea.


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## fihe (Aug 30, 2012)

that's a very good idea that you checked it yourself first, because I never did any such thing when I had to submit papers for my classes in college. I just know that my university has a zero-tolerance policy for plagiarism. if it's discovered that someone in your group did plagiarize, they'll probably be expelled. if the person in fact reused a paper they wrote for a previous class, I'm not sure if that would be considered plagiarism per se, but I don't think that's usually allowed either.


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