Prevent Plagiarism with Creative Assignments
Ideas for Faculty

Ideas to help insure students doing their own work on the research paper:

1.  Have students include an annotated bibliography instead of the traditional list of sources.  This could be required early in the semester to ensure that they actually start researching and reading early,

2.  Require photocopies of references with relevant sections highlighted.

3.  Have students present their papers orally, answer questions, defend their positions.

4.  Assign papers shorter than 6 pages (6 being the minimum for most paper mills).

5.  Require a certain number of recent references restricted to holdings in the university library system.

6.  Require students to relate their topic to one or more specific sources--a particular article, what was discussed in class or in the textbook, etc.

7.  Have students write an essay to answer these kinds of questions:  What did you learn from the assignment?  What problems did you face and how did you overcome them?  What research strategy did you follow?  Where did you locate most of your sources?  What is the most important thing you learned from investigating this subject?  (Harris)  What part of the project are you most proud of?  This could be: 
    a.  Written in class on the day they turn in their papers 
    b.  Turned in with the paper.
    c.  E-mailed to you throughout the semester as they work on the assignment.

 
Topic and assignment ideas to eliminate paper mill use:

1.  Write about local issues.

2.  Assign various sides of an issue to students in the class.  Then have them debate it when they turn in the papers.

3.  Provide a list of topics.  Change it every year.

4..  Have students select a primary source document such as a diary and write about its author, historical context, identify/explain unfamiliar terms, customs, etc.  The library has collections of many primary source materials.  Any of the reference librarians can help you.  

5.  Assign a multimedia presentation rather than a straight term paper.

6.  Have the student adopt the point of view of an historical character.

7.  Have students compare a scholarly journal article, a magazine article, a newspaper article, and a Web site on the same topic.

8.   Interview older family members about their earlier life; research that time period and weave personal material with background.  Use newspapers and magazines of the time to see what information the person was receiving.

9.  Ask each student to describe a career they envision themselves in and then research the career choice.  What are the leading companies in that area?  Why?  (If they choose something generic like marketing, what is the best company in their county of residence to work for?  Why?)  If the company is graded publicly, what is its net worth?  What is the outlook for this occupation?  Expected starting salary?  How do the outlook and salaries vary by geography?  (Ricigliano)

Sources used:

Collins, Terry.  Strategies for preventing plagiarism. University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. http://cisw.cla.umn.edu/plagiarism/faculty/strategies.html

Harris, Robert.  Anti-plagiarism strategies for research papers.  Virtual Salt.  http://www.virtualsalt.com/antiplag.htm

Preventing plagiarism.  Montgomery College.  http://www.montgomerycollege.edu/library/preventingplagiarism.pdf

Preventing plagiarism. University of Alberta Libraries.  http://www.library.ualberta.ca/guides/plagiarism/preventing/

Ricigliano, Lori.  Ideas for Library Related Assignments.  University of Puget Sound.  http://library.ups.edu/instruct/assign.htm

Stilling, Glenn Ellen Starr.  Beyond the research paper: Working with faculty to maximize library-related assignments.  In:  Integrating Information Literacy into the College Experience.  Pierian Press, 2003. (Truman General Collection Z711.2 .I67 2003)


Updated 8/2009