Assignment due 8am, sent to friend to be color copied at 10:15pm. Plagiarism?

[thedudeabides]

I think he broke a rule, so he takes the punishment.  What I think should have happened?  The girl who tried to help him should have told him no; she's suffering a lot more than he is right now for trying to be helpful.

As far as talking to the teacher goes, he's a junior, so he should try handling this on his own, although from reading the rule, he doesn't seem to have much ground to argue from.

[RegionMom]

Here are some answers, and clarification-
DS missed two days of school for performing at a school honors music event out-of-town, so he was a couple of days behind his classmates.  This was less than a week's turnaround, and some students were still asking for photos the night before due. 

He was focused on making up two tests and staying on top of his other subjects, and this ultimately was a small assignment.  While I consider 10pm to be pushing it a bit, he did get it done with time to spare.

Teacher had a due time of 12 noon, but most assignments are due at 8am, and with no way to submit it once in school, he considered it due at 8am.

Yes, the photos were absolutely required.  The photos were actually the only evidence the students had of their lab.  DS says he asked the teacher, the day it was assigned, "what if we do not have a color printer?"  He says she responded by pantomiming drawing, and then said, "or, you could have a friend print it out for you."

Teacher claimed at their conversation today that she would "never" say something like that.  I think if she did, and/or had clarified it was photos only to be printed, then all would be understood.

And, yes, I trust my son's memory. Think...almost like Sheldon, from Big Bang Theory.

His grade is docked because he sent it to be printed, thusly, "sending electronic files to be graded."  Since the photos themselves are the only lab data, then technically, the entire class should be penalized. 

We do not know if the girl changed her report, or if she even read his.  DS says she is a good student.  DS helped answer many confusing questions on the class FaceBook page, so many students, in a way, worked together.

I do not know if the teacher looked on FaceBook.  There has been a huge crackdown, and even a sermon in chapel, about the evils of social media.  DS's "sin" is that he sent the data.

He asked on the class page, "Hey, can anyone with a color printer do this printing for me?"  And two girls responded.  Two copies of DS's lab report were turned in.  The teacher threw one away, she told DS. 

Teacher says that in reading the 25 reports, that this one girl's paper read similarly to DS's, and that is when she called in the girl.  The girl reported that she printed out DS's paper, and did nothing to change hers.

DS got called in and he confirmed that he sent it to be printed.  He was told that he was losing 50% of his grade, and this lab was 10% of the semester grade, so he lost 5 points. 

The girl spoke to him at lunch, upset, stating that she did not change her work.  DS is not sure if she can take a 10% hit on her grade.  He offered to take the same punishment, and while the teacher said his offer was admirable, it would not happen. 

DS had no idea his asking to have his paper printed would be a violation. 

I checked the school handbook and it only cites MLA format and rules.

We had to dig into the school web site and the teacher's page to find it, but what I quoted in the OP in italics is on page 3 of the 5 page syllabus. 

As for DS's helping others on FaceBook, he says that by helping others with their questions, it clarifies things for him. He learns more by teaching others.

Yes, I see it as a time waster, but he does need a bit of time to chill. 

I found out as I was writing this that two other students were called in because their reports were similar to each others,  and both had grades docked.

Yes, these two also posted a bit about their labs on FaceBook.  I tried to joke with DS that he is Source Q, but he is not. happy. and is now shut up in his room. 

He had no idea he was creating a firestorm of scrutiny.  He would gladly take a zero, and offered.

But I do need to confirm that the teacher had the correct grade from last week.  And I would like to point out that we had to dig for the policy, and that sending photos, and printing papers was deemed ok, but printing lab reports is a big no-no, and that the rules need to be made more transparent.

Hope that answered all your questions!!

 

[ccnumber4]

What, exactly, is your question?  Thedudeabides has it right.  This is your son's issue to solve if he so chooses.  He is a junior in high school and he will not be able to rely on mommy's help when he gets to college.  Now is the time to start expecting him to fend for himself.  This really seems like a non-issue to me.  Except for maybe the girl who lost all her points for helping him. 

[Veronica]

Your son is in a good student in his junior year of high school, correct?  Then I think you need to back away from this.  This is something he'll need to deal with himself.  I would have been mortified if my parents would have been gotten anywhere near to this level of involved with my schoolwork at that age. 

Don't check the school handbook, don't read through the teacher's page, don't worry about this any longer.  You need to let him take care of this himself.  In a year he'll be at college and this will good practice for him handling his own problems for himself as an adult. 

[Winterlight]

I think you need to step back and let him deal with it. His screw up, his problem.

[zinzin]

Your son is a junior? Yes, he definitely needs to be the one dealing with this - once he's in university (and an adult), legally, he's the only one who can, so it's best he learn now.

[AustenFan]

What, exactly, is your question?  Thedudeabides has it right.  This is your son's issue to solve if he so chooses.  He is a junior in high school and he will not be able to rely on mommy's help when he gets to college.  Now is the time to start expecting him to fend for himself.  This really seems like a non-issue to me.  Except for maybe the girl who lost all her points for helping him. 

Agreed.

There's something very *off* about this situation.

[RegionMom]

His first words to me after school were, "have you seen the e-mail yet?"

And he did not know that asking a report to be printed was a screw-up.

In a year, he will know what college he will be attending, but he will not be there yet.  He just turned 17 and is not fully cooked yet.  How do I teach him how to deal with adult problems if we do not talk about it? 

If I had shut him down with, "look it up, Oh, you screwed up, sucks to be you, even worse for the girl," then where is the parenting?

Instead, I had him look up the hard to find policy, asked for his understanding and what the teacher and the girl said, and told him that I would seek advice here. 

He now knows to never ever send electronic data.  period.  So, it will not be a problem in college.

He could offer to tutor the girl, but she is also a good student, and they are not close.

I did not ask to see progress reports when we were mailed that our kids received them.  I have not read their papers, I am not involved in their school work, have not been to a single conference, I would not recognize a few of their teachers, and I do not email them, so how much more can I back off?

My son was confused and I had him check the rules.  The ball is in his court.

[thedudeabides]

I'm glad he's not going to offer to tutor the girl.  That would really come off as adding insult to injury since her offer to help him got her in trouble.

[Yvaine]

It actually makes a lot of sense to me that the science department would have its own policy on plagiarism that was stricter than the lit department's.

When you're writing a lit paper, it's pretty obvious if you've turned in the same lit paper as some other kid in class, because normally everyone would phrase their ideas differently. Using the other kid's words would be a red flag.

In the sciences, a lot of the work is more black-and-white, the answer is wrong or it's right, objective answers. You can't rely as much on checking whether students have the same answers...because if they've got the right answers, they'll all have the same answers, kwim? You can look a little bit at who has missed the exact same ones, but it's still not going to be foolproof. So instead they've made this "Scientific Integrity" policy so there's no wiggle room for anyone who does plagiarize.

I still don't get why he didn't draw rather than risk getting himself and the girl into trouble, or why a B&W print would be unacceptable when a drawing was acceptable.

[penelope2017]

His first words to me after school were, "have you seen the e-mail yet?"

And he did not know that asking a report to be printed was a screw-up.

In a year, he will know what college he will be attending, but he will not be there yet.  He just turned 17 and is not fully cooked yet.  How do I teach him how to deal with adult problems if we do not talk about it? 

If I had shut him down with, "look it up, Oh, you screwed up, sucks to be you, even worse for the girl," then where is the parenting?

Instead, I had him look up the hard to find policy, asked for his understanding and what the teacher and the girl said, and told him that I would seek advice here. 

He now knows to never ever send electronic data.  period.  So, it will not be a problem in college.

He could offer to tutor the girl, but she is also a good student, and they are not close.

I did not ask to see progress reports when we were mailed that our kids received them.  I have not read their papers, I am not involved in their school work, have not been to a single conference, I would not recognize a few of their teachers, and I do not email them, so how much more can I back off?

My son was confused and I had him check the rules.  The ball is in his court.

Great! So what are you asking us here?

[Tabby Uprising]

Are you concerned your son won't be civil if he decides to discuss this with his teacher?  If so, you can certainly do a bit of coaching beforehand.  He can still handle the conversation, but you can provide some pointers if you think he may be a bit rough around the edges!

[zinzin]

Perhaps encourage your son to understand the policies of all of the departments. Less helpful is labeling those policies as unfair for him. I understand that it seems unfair that he was caught by a rule he didn't know, but part of his job as a student is being aware of just those rules. Best for him to consider it a lesson in not assuming the rules for one course apply to another.

Teachers don't make these rules to be mean or cruelly punitive. They make them for exactly the sorts of reasons Yvaine outliines (she also captures well why there is such variation).

[TZ]

We had to dig into the school web site and the teacher's page to find it, but what I quoted in the OP in italics is on page 3 of the 5 page syllabus. 

So the policy in question was spelled out on the class syllabus? In my experience, the syllabus is always handed out on the first day of class, in which case your DS should have been familiar with it. The fact that you had to visit two websites to find a copy doesn't necessarily mean you had to dig for the information. IMO, it was pretty clear, as was the violation. I do feel sorry for the poor girl, though.

[citadelle]

We had to dig into the school web site and the teacher's page to find it, but what I quoted in the OP in italics is on page 3 of the 5 page syllabus. 

So the policy in question was spelled out on the class syllabus? In my experience, the syllabus is always handed out on the first day of class, in which case your DS should have been familiar with it. The fact that you had to visit two websites to find a copy doesn't necessarily mean you had to dig for the information. IMO, it was pretty clear, as was the violation. I do feel sorry for the poor girl, though.

And if he has an eidetic memory, ala Sheldon Cooper, then he would remember the policy from the syllabus