Letter to a student engaged in plagiarism

Dear Ms. X,

Thanks for your letter.  Unfortunately, I cannot accept you as a student on the scholarship program.  I would like to explain the reason behind my decision.

Your research idea is potentially interesting, and I admire your knowledge of fuzzy set mathematics.  You also conducted the interview very well.  However, when reading your published article and then reading your proposal again, I came to the conclusion that many parts of these writings are “copied” from other articles.  For example, in your article on measuring CSR, the entire discussion of the CSR definitions is taken from the article from Carroll.  The text is shortened, but it is an identical copy in terms of the structure and wording.  Similarly, your PhD proposal has material copied extensively from the Cho and Hambrick article.

I am sure that you are aware that this way of using material is not acceptable scientific practice.  Your papers cite these sources, but they use the exact words and ideas from these other papers as if they were your own.  Under these circumstances, I cannot have confidence in the integrity of your writings.  You might also know that the German foreign minister, Mr. Guttenberg, had his PhD title revoked and was forced to leave his position in government for plagiarism – the copying of sources in his PhD.  In the UK, I have expelled MSc students from university on similar grounds.  In your case, sending me plagiarised material as part of your application has simply wasted both my time and yours. 

If you decide to embark on an academic career elsewhere, I would urge you to take this as a warning signal.  Spend time to familiarize yourself with proper ways to attribute ideas and use citations to scientific literature.  Even more importantly, you will need to develop your own original thoughts and write in your own voice.  I can imagine possible reasons why someone might be tempted to copy material -- the challenges of writing in a foreign language, time pressures, competition to be successful, and so on.  Science is based on a community of trust based on commonly accepted methods and honest reporting of research findings.  If we begin to doubt the integrity of scientific work, the very foundations of our common enterprise is lost.    If you are not committed to these standards with your whole person, then this career path is not the right one for you. 

I wish you the best of luck in moving forward,

Gregory Jackson