Plagiarism Story
Steven was almost done with his final semester of college. Three more weeks and he would finally have that diploma in his hand. It had been a difficult journey. He had gone back to school almost four years ago. He had started college right out of high school, but quit after his first year so he could work full-time.
Five years later, he decided he needed to finish his degree. Steven was not getting anywhere in his career and knew he needed to make some sacrifices; he needed to buckle down and finish school.
The past year had been particularly busy for Steven. He was finishing his final year of school, and had been looking for a job without much success. Most of the jobs he was applying for did not want to interview him until he had his degree completed. This was the main reason he was so eager to graduate.
His wife had been supporting the family while Steven finished his final year. She was very eager to quit her job and start a small home-based business. She was just waiting for Steven to graduate and get a good job so she could finally quit her job. Steven was also eager to get a job so his wife could stay home because he knew how much she was looking forward to it.
The pressure of finishing school, finding a job, and making his wife happy was really starting to get to Steven. He was taking more courses than usual this semester so he could be done sooner. The workload was getting to him and he had more than a few sleepless nights.
He had three big projects due before the end of the semester and was worried that he would not finish all of them in time. One of the assignments was particularly agitating to him. It was for an elective course he was not really interested in. He did not enjoy the course and thought the content was trivial since it did not relate to his field. He had put the assignment off until the last minute and now he found himself with 12 hours before it was due, and had not even started it yet.
It was a four-page report on the environmental impacts of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989. Steven had not been doing very well in the course. He knew he needed at least a passing grade on this report to ensure he passed the class and was able to graduate. He did not need an “A” -- he just needed to turn something in. He could not afford to skip the assignment.
As he weighed his options, the thought crossed his mind to just copy some stuff from the Internet and patch together something so he would at least get better than a 0%. He knew students were not supposed to do that kind of thing, but the more he thought about it, the easier it was to justify it. He thought, “I don’t even like the class…it’s not part of my major…it’s just an elective…the plagiarism warning in the syllabus was tiny and kind of hidden…it can’t be that big of a deal or they would have emphasized it more.” Steven convinced himself that it would be easier to copy existing material than to pull an all-nighter.

He found a bunch of sources online, copied and pasted, and cobbled something together. He changed words around and