plagiarism.

we've got a friend living in kazahkstan right now. apparently, hilarious things happen to him on an everyday basis. funny students. ridiculous policies. bitter cold. and students copying their homework off the internet.

see. this happens here fairly frequently. i'll assign a writing assignment about, say, the sun, and i'll get, in return, 20 papers all copied and pasted from the same wikipedia site. once, a girl gave a presentation on all of the "houses of ill repute" in auckland, new zealand, speaking about the "ladies of the night" and "illicit activities." when asked what that meant, she thought it was a club district. not a red light one. because not only do the students copy, they don't even bother to look at what they've handed in.

i'm sure students in the USA cheat and copy and steal... but at least there is some creativity in hiding the cheating. because in these other parts it's blatant. and hilarious.

larry's facebook status the other day: "One of my students just sent me an assignment via email. The subject line was "Review which was copied from internet." It was a film review by Roger Ebert. my sides are busting.

and just a few days later: "The same student who sent me the "review copyed from internet" just sent me "review which I try to write myself." It's one of the most blatant Google translate jobs I've seen." more than a chuckle.

i guess students everywhere are the same. looking for the easy way out of a hard assignment. i say, keep it up students, every now and then i need a good laugh