I read through the TAMIU policies pertaining to plagiarism–and I think it takes considerable stretch, if not outright invention, to suggest that a professor is required to place a public notice of students caught cheating. The professor is the first line and has some specific responsibilities and responses. The professor is the one who gives the grade and that is pretty much granted as a right. The professor makes the determiniation of giving the automatic F with the notation on the record that this was for cheating. The professor has an obligation to inform specific persons–which will lead to further determinations to be made by the Honors Council–which will lead to anything from nothing additional (the notated grade, as determined by the professor, would be the only sanction) all the way up through expulsion from the university. This seems like considerable power–and as a result has some due process provisions–none of which include any ability to challenge the grade given by the professor.

Without seeing exactly what the professor posted to the website, it is a little difficult to form an opinion regarding whether it violated FERPA. If it was a response that included a citation showing how the work was not original (essentially the professor’s statement in response), then I would believe that it falls outside of FERPA. However, if it communicated the student’s grade, then this is a student record, and would be covered by FERPA. I know that in public record’s law there is a distinction between what exists as a record, and what constitutes creation of a new record. Example: a public agency may be required to respond to a request for all expenditures. This would not imply an obligation for the agency to create a new record that communicates them all together in some format or compilation that is sought by some member of the public. While the students made their papers public by posting them on a website, adding the F grade to them was creation of a new record–which contained protected information.

FERPA simply doesn’t apply.
(1) Students have no privacy rights in works they posted publicly (or even within the class). The DOE has issued specific guidance to that effect.
(2) FERPA applies to “educational records” as defined in the Act. No educational record was ever created or disclosed.
(3) FERPA applies solely to records maintained by the institution. The course website was not maintained by TAMIU.
(4) Even if FERPA applied to this situation, FERPA specifically allows students’ names, addresses, and other directory information to be published.

TAMIU didn’t know what the FERPA rules were and apparently had never read it. Because I practiced regulatory law before going into finance and technology, the department dean asked me to advise the University about how FERPA applied to the course. I distributed my analysis to the administration a week before disclosing the plagiarists’ names. To my knowledge, no one in the world disputes my legal analysis on the subject.

I followed University policy and procedures precisely. The University’s Honor Code actually imposed an obligation for me to do exactly as I did. See http://www.iycc.org/node/368.

The department chair and college dean carefully reviewed the syllabus at the beginning of the semester, and in particular the language about plagiarism. Although they didn’t like the language, they ultimately approved it because I refused to continue teaching the course otherwise.

On a moral and practical level, disclosure and the concomitant humiliation is appropriate. I have written an extended analysis here: http://www.iycc.org/node/370.

I stand behind my actions. You should too.

Happy Trails,

Loye Young
Isaac & Young Computer Company
Laredo, Texas
http://www.iycc.net

And that’s where it all breaks down. As a previous commenter noted, professors aren’t infallible in the area of plagiarism accusations. The whole system with the dean and the honor council and the “XF” or whatever doesn’t exist to protect plagiarists; it exists to protect the falsely accused.

I really do understand the desire to punish plagiarists. I hate to admit that, in my experience, outright plagiarism is a 1-to-1 indicator of a fundamental lack of respect for others that never goes away and makes a person unable to function productively under the “constraints” of government, employment, religion, or even mutual friendship. That fact is tragic…but the idea of permanently labeling someone with that characteristic when that’s not the full story? Much worse.

If their policy included due process for the students by the honors council (likely), seems like the U has just followed their established policy/practices–which may take some time, but likely will arrive at justice.

FERPA may prohibit unauthorized disclosure–however any student who needs to make use of their school records in any way (application to the next school, for instance, employment, etc), will be asked to authorize disclosure. Any refusal would raise questions.

What you’re missing is that universities investigate internally for the sole purpose of not involving the justice system. I’ve seen it happen many times. Theft, burglary, vandalism, assault, etc.

The plagiarized projects were submitted as posts to that very same blog. That is, the students’ work was already public by virtue of having been posted on a publicly accessible site.

For you FERPA-knowledgeable folks out there, would it have been a violation of FERPA for Mr. Young to comment on one of the offending blog posts something like “This article is copied directly from (source) without credit or reference. This is plagiarism, so you will receive a zero for this assignment, per the course rules which were laid out in the course syllabus.”?

AFAICT, this is not correct. FERPA prohibits disclosing the results of some disciplinary proceedings, including those that may involve the commission of a crime, but FERPA doesn’t prohibit a separate criminal prosecution for the crime.

When I was a TA I had one blatant case of copying – in a 4th semester German class I taught, the students were assigned a 3 page essay as homework. The student instead copied three pages from a short story by Thomas Mann and turned that in, without even changing the title. Obviously, this was fairly easy to detect.

I was just a TA, so I brought this to the attention of the professor who supervised the section. My university had 3 options for first offense cheating – fail the assignment, fail the course, or fail the course and be expelled from the department for one year. Simply failing the student for the assignment did not seem enough of a penalty since the cheating was so pervasive. Also, failing him only for the assignment would provide an incentive to cheat, in a way – the student stated that he copied the paper because he didn’t think he would have time to do it otherwise. Meaning that if he doesn’t do the paper, he gets an F, but if he cheats, he might get an F, or he might get a better grade. Therefore, cheating is the better option.

But he did admit the cheating upon being confronted with it, so the most severe option didn’t seem warranted. But being failed from the class did have significant consequences – as the student was a graduating senior and the class was the final sequence of the foreign language requirement, the student did not graduate on time and, apparently, could not begin work at the job he had already been offered on time. On the other hand, he was allowed to repeat the course in the summer and graduate in the summer, which may have allowed him to still keep the offered job,starting 2 months later.

All in all, though, I thought that this was a very reasonable way of dealing with the matter.