In Tucker Carlson’s article entitled That’s Outrageous, Carlson ends his article on plagiarism with the following line: “Laugh if you want, but cheating just may be the next civil right” (41). In a ridiculous case lacking in common sense, Carlson explains the situation in biology teacher Christine Pelton’s class where 28 students were caught plagiarizing. Pelton assigned her students an end-of-term project that was ongoing during the semester. After receiving the 118 projects, Pelton used new Internet plagiarism-checking software to review them. To her dismay, Pelton discovered that almost 25% of the students had plagiarized their projects. According to Pelton, “entire sections of the papers were identical, copied from the same Internet websites” (Carlson 40).
Like most teachers would do, Pelton decided to place a mark of “zero” on each of the projects she found plagiarized. All of the students, therefore, received a failing grade in the class. While many might think this was a normal course of events, not so parents and administrators at the school. Parents of the 28 students began to complain that Pelton’s penalty was too severe, and, unbelievably, the school board agreed. The next day Pelton went to her class and discovered she had lost all control among her students, “I went to my class and tried to teach the kids, but they were whooping and hollering and saying, ‘We don’t have to listen to you anymore’” (Carlson 40). Pelton immediately quit in protest.
The students in Pelton’s class were given partial credit for the plagiarized projects. While the students were thrilled, if I were a student in Ms. Pelton’s class who hadn’t cheated and had received a lower grade than those who cheated, I would be furious. While the reactions of parents of the cheaters might be anticipated, the decision of the school board remains inexplicable. I would be
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