Sunday, January 26, 2020

Effect Of Plagiarism In University

Effect Of Plagiarism In University Plagiarism is to use someone elses words or idea without acknowledging the source. With the development of globalization process, more and more students choose to study aboard. Different education background precipitate plagiarism becoming more serious. Since the diploma from international university has become more valued by most people, resulting in a large number of people to study abroad is not in order to acquire knowledge, but in exchange for a diploma. This lead to a lot of students who are at the low foundation choose to study abroad, but limited academic competence and can not be independently completed the task of assignment, then they would use plagiarism complete it. According to that plagiarism is becoming more common in university. Another reason of plagiarism is that some students lack of understanding on foreign universities plagiarism discipline, therefore during the process of finishing the assignment the mistake may be happened. In short, plagiarism is a very serious issue in the academic writing. To avoid plagiarism, students must complete understand what the plagiarism is, and the cause of plagiarism. Only understanding the cause and effect could prevent it. There are many reasons for the cause of plagiarism. Moreover it has several negative effects on students and education system. Causes Do not understand plagiarism First of all, sometimes students do not realize that they are plagiarizing, because sometimes the inaccurate language can be regard as plagiarism. There is one way to avoid plagiarism is using the quotation marks around the copy words, and also need to add the authors name and publish year. But improper quote is a kind of plagiarism. When a direct quote is used, the quotation mark must be put in. If not, even if the reference is provided. This situation could cause the writer be accused of trying claim another persons work as his own (http://library.leeds.ac.uk/tutorials/plagiarism/). Even the quote is completely correct; overuse of direct quotations can lead a poor mark on the assignment. So its not a good choice to use too many quotations. That is why students need to use paraphrase and summary in academic writing task. An unfortunate thing is for the international students, especially the students from the non-English speaking countries. English as their second language they can not use it as well as their first language, so paraphrase and summary may make trouble in their writing. Students may use some sources full of complex sentence structure. To paraphrase those sentences is hard to organize words as well as the original one. That may make some students thinking their own work cannot compare and they may choose to copy the original source or just change some words of them, but use its primordial structure. (Kuhn 1957) To avoid plagiarism when paraphrasing, not only should the original words be changed, but also the sentence structure of the newly paraphrased text must be different from that of the original ( Roig, 2001) . According to that, students do not really understand it maybe plagiarizing. Inaccurate referencing In addition, inaccurate referencing could also cause the plagiarism. It includes five forms. (http://www.uea.ac.uk/plagiarism/understanding_plagiarism). Firstly reference must be clear to readers exactly which parts of essay draw on which scholars work. Simply including a bibliography at the end of assignment does not help the reader to distinguish which is own work and which is drawn from other scholars. Secondly using misleading reference is not allowed. Students can not forge references or include ones that they have not read. When students do not read the original but find it quoted in others article, it must indicate both the original text and the one they found. If only the original was acknowledged which is falsification. Third one, the ideas, theories, findings, etc of others are failed to attribute. Even there is no exact words quoted, it is still another scholars work that need to be acknowledged with a reference. Fourth one, the images, diagrams, tables etc should be also referenced in the same way as words. Even if the information in the presentation has been reworked, it also should be acknowledged where the data come from. The last but not least, on occasion students use some source without reference because they think it is a common knowledge, but sometimes the assuming is incorrect and it must actually be ascribed a certain individual or individuals. All in all, incomplete or inaccurate references can lead to plagiarism. Students need to check all references thoroughly when proofreading to ensure that no errors have been made. All references should be complete so that they can be traced by the reader. ( http://www.uea.ac.uk/plagiarism/plagiarism_forms5) Pressure According to famous research (Patrick G 1998), pressure is the strongest factor lead to possibility of plagiarism or cheating. The main kinds of pressure are grade pressure, time pressure, and task pressure. These three kinds of pressure are not isolated, for example, in many conditions without some time restraint the likeliness of feeling task pressure was reduced. (1) Grade pressure means academic pressures to a certain extent. When the students study in a university, they will face this pressure. Getting a degree is not a simple thing. To finish the assignment is quite a hard work and sometimes may get a low mark or even worse after a long period effort, after that student perhaps feels awful. Moreover going to study with an awful feeling can not achieve a satisfactory result. Then students will find themselves in the cycle. (https://www.york.ac.uk/students/support/health/problems/academic-pressures/) When students in this situation probably choose plagiarize to get a better mark to avoid it. (2) Time pressure -Students are often juggling conflicting constraints on the time they allocate to study due to working part-time or an active sporting or social life. Spending a significant amount of time undertaking paid employment whilst studying at university can present challenging situations which are likely to cause students to resort to plagiarism. Although there is no causal link between plagiarism and students being employed, evidence has found that students face increasing pressure to work whilst studying full time, putting them at risk of academic dishonesty or intentional omission of references as they make choices between allocating time between study and work.(Powell. L 2012) Time pressure maybe a excuse for students but it does exist. (3) Task pressure Task pressure relates to the number and types of assignments a student is struggling to complete during a given time period.(Patrick G 1998) Sometimes students will be given many assignments by different tutors but need to finish them in a short time. There is one more pressure need to be statement. The whole education system pressure The number of undergraduate and graduate students has been growing in almost every country around the world and those who enter the system stay for a longer time. (Just consider how much time it takes to get a Ph.D.) The personal investment is greater, as is the competition. In addition, there are more countries trying to move into the big leagues of academia, which adds even more pressure to the whole system.(Ivan Pacheco 2011). This pressure provokes the plagiarism in the academic field. more:http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/the_world_view/is_academic_corruption_on_the_rise#ixzz24z8KBAk9 Negative attitude Final cause is the negative attitude. Personal attitudes determine success or failure. The students with negative attitude could effect their academic motivation. If the academic motivation went to the negative part, students will lose their learning interests. When students lose it they will cost more time on enjoying college life, such as go parties or anticipate other activities, and when they pick up books they would feel sleepy. It is necessary to consider how these students can pass the exam? The majority of students may choose cheating in the exam or even pay someone to write the essay or just copy and paste others work then add a reference list at the end. Besides the student, even the professors are drawn into cheating issues. A professor at Columbia Universitys Teachers College who was propelled into the national spotlight when a noose was found on her office door last fall has been found to have plagiarized the work of a former colleague and two former students, the college has announced. (KAREN W. ARENSON and ELISSA GOOTMAN 2008 http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/21/education/21prof.html?_r=1adxnnl=1pagewanted=alladxnnlx=1346065286-naQLgtFv9vk7661DOblX1Q). Academic research is tough and endless. If the professors feel too eager to succeed or finish the tasks given by university, they may choose a closer way to succeed by plagiarism. To sum up above mentioned, plagiarism include two main types, Unintentional plagiarism and intentional plagiarism. Plagiarism is not allowed whatever the reason is. Effects Respect The first effect of plagiarism is this behavior is disrespectful to the original author. It is so rude to use anothers idea without referencing. Taking the exact words of another person without attribution is just like stealing a car from another person (Janice Moulton and George Robinson, Smith College, 2002). Michelle Langley (2010) claims that A student who has copied the work of another person is not showing respect for his own creative and intellectual potential. It also shows that he does not care about maintaining personal integrity. (http://www.ehow.com/facts_5472037_effect-plagiarism-students.html#ixzz24md4DHE4) Worsen academic environment Plagiarism tarnished the academic purity. When many students cheating in university, the whole learning environment will be affected then make the situation worse. When one student pass the assignment through plagiarism successful, and people around him know this news, they may try it. Then more and more students will find it is easy to finish assignment by plagiarism. That will make the number of people who plagiarism rise continue. That is minority students plagiarize cause plagiarism rife. It is certainly effect the whole academic environment in the university. Even in the famous university Oxford can not avoid it Plagiarism could threaten the value of a degree from Oxford University as students increasingly copy large slabs of work from the internet and submit it as their own, the university has warned.(Alexandra Smith 2006 http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2006/mar/15/highereducation.news) That is plagiarism produce plagiarism. Academic corruption The third effect is plagiarism make academic corruption on the rise. (Ivan Pacheco 2011) Plagiarism is one main part of academic corruption. (Michael Agelasto, 2004). According to that, when plagiarism is becoming more serious , it will be accompanied by the academic corruption. The fact is that the number of students in the UK who plagiarized is rising. (BBC news) That leads to academic corruption become more serious. For example, China now is experiencing the most serious academic corruption in recent years. In Chinese university, students finish the course work in the selected course by copy and paste from internet will not receive a punishment. And if one student finishes his/her assignment, the others will copy his/her work. Also it will be not a big deal in Chinese university. Those things make situation worse. Punishment Students will receive a stiff penalty when they were caught in plagiarism. In educational institutions, particularly universities and colleges, treat plagiarism as a serious problem of academic purity. They admonish their students of serious results for plagiarizing the assignment of others. Maybe different colleges and universities have different discipline on plagiarism. There are four common penalty always be used by Our Lady of the Lake College. (1)Lowering a students grade on the assignment (2)Giving the student a failing grade on the assignment (3)Lowering the students overall course grade (4)Giving the student a failing grade in the course (http://www.ololcollege.edu/archive_material/plagiarism_project/Penalties_Plagiarism1.html) Loss of Degree or Job University students who were accused plagiarism College students who commit plagiarism face the loss of their degrees upon discovery of the offense. College faculty members who plagiarize the work of other scholars face serious consequences as well. Professors who commit plagiarism may lose tenure and face even if being the loss of their jobs and damaging reputations. An academic found guilty of plagiarism faces the permanent loss of her credibility as a scholar. Plagiarism also may damage the reputation of schools as places of learning and intellectual inquiry. Damaged Relationships Plagiarism poisons the relationship between students and teachers by undermining the mutual trust that is an important element of the learning process. Widespread incidents of plagiarism, such as students taking work from the Internet and presenting it as their own, force teachers to act as police investigators, constantly searching for wrongdoing. All students become suspect in such an environment, and learning becomes impossible. Suspicion and mistrust replace intellectual curiosity and trust. Plagiarism also damages relationships between students who plagiarize and those who earn their grades honestly. Lack of Critical Thinking When students or instructors present others work as their own, they fail to develop and use critical thinking skills, which are necessary for learning and success in life. Financial Aid Continued receipt of federal financial aid is based upon a certain percentage of successfully completed course work. Students who receive Fs or who are suspended for entire semesters will likely be affected in financial aid eligibility. Private scholarship eligibility could also be affected. Reputation Schools maintain student records, and instructors share information informally. Students who are caught plagiarizing may develop reputations as cheaters. Teachers will likely scrutinize students with reputations more carefully than other students. All in all, effects of plagiarism can conclude into two main parts. Effects on education and students. Conclusion

Saturday, January 18, 2020

Conveyer belt project parts Essay

The work breakdown structure essentially is a decomposition of the work to be completed by the project team in order to successfully accomplish the project objectives and deliverables. It’s a very practical tool to visualise the work that needs to be done, however that is about all it’s useful for. The information provided by the work breakdown structure is not enough to allow the project team to identify any milestones or points of significance in the project. At this stage each element of the project has only been identified, none of them have been time scheduled, cost estimated or placed in a definitive chronological order, making it difficult to identify any significant milestones. Network scheduling refers to the graphical representation of activities that define the sequence of work in a project. It is an important tool used to visualise the chronological order of activities needed to be completed in order to meet the project deliverables and objectives. The project team decided to use Microsoft project to develop the network schedule for the conveyer belt project. However before a network schedule could be produced it was necessary to enter some important information into Microsoft project. Firstly the work calendar had to be customised. It was necessary to ensure that work was only completed from Monday to Friday during an 8 hour work day and that all relevant public holidays which would affect work were accounted for. Below in Figure 1 is the work calendar in Microsoft project. Following this the project team could enter the estimated duration of each work package and place them in chronological order. With the conveyer belt project set to begin on the 4th of January 2010, Microsoft project estimated the project would be complete on the 2nd of February 2012 and would take a total of 530 days to finish. On the following page in Figure 2 is a gant chart produced by Microsoft project which illustrates the schedule of each activity in the project. It is quite clear that the network of the project isn’t very sensitive. Both the gant chart on the previous page and the network diagram at the end of this section show a clear critical path in red. Although there are some activities with only a few days slack, namely the assembly of preproduction models which only has 5 days slack, the remaining activities in the project not on the critical path have 30 or more days slack. If some of the activities were to delay it isn’t very likely that a lot of critical paths would develop since majority of the activities have a reasonable amount of slack. Utilities documentation is easily the most flexible of the activities since it has the largest amount of slack adding up to 115 days. Now that the project team had successfully developed a valid network schedule it is more convenient to identify significant milestones in the project. Besides the start and end dates, 4th January 2010 and 2nd February 2012 respectively, the project team was able to identify two other milestones listed below: †¢Integration First Phase and †¢System Hard/Software Test The first phase of integration was identified as a milestone since its start date is heavily reliant on so many other activities. Before integration first phase can even begin, six other activities preceding it must also be completed. In addition to this integration first phase is on the critical path, meaning if there were to be any delays which affected the start date of this activity then there would be a delay in the entire project. In contrary to this the system hard/software test was determined to be a significant milestone because it had so many activities reliant on its successful completion. Four other activities could not start until the system hard/software tests were completed. Similarly to integration first phase, the system hard/software tests also fall on the critical path, thus if there any delays on this activity it will delay the overall project and delay the start of other activities. Whilst creating the network schedule for the conveyer belt project we have been able to produce two useful graphical representation of the project schedule. Both a gant chart and a network diagram have been included in the report. Both are extremely useful tools to visualise how the project and its activities are scheduled but both are also inherently different. The Gantt chart is more useful in representing the timing of various tasks which are required to successfully complete the project where as the network diagram is more useful in identifying the various tasks of the project and ordering them in their chronological order. Both charts have their own advantages and disadvantages respectively. Below in Table 1 is a summary of both network schedules advantages and disadvantages.

Friday, January 10, 2020

Bringing a Change in Organizational Culture Essay

Critically explain why changing organisational culture is so difficult and how managers can do it. Culture can be defined as â€Å"a set of basic tacit assumptions about how the world is and ought to be that a group of people share and that determines their perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and, to some degree, their overt behaviour† (Schein, 1996). Organizational culture is depend on differences in norms and shared values which are learned in workplace and to direct behaviour of members in the particular organisation. Cabrera, Cabrera& Barajas 2001) Organisational culture was built on its shared beliefs and values which was the guidance to solve problems. This essay will introduce the definition of organisational culture and explain why changing organisational culture is so difficult. The main reasons are the fear of uncertain future and difficult to establish the organisational culture. In addition, the essay is to interpret how managers can change organisational culture and how does it work. Managers can change organisational culture through communication and management strategies. This essay may introduce the detail about changing organisational culture. Most scholars think that changing organisational culture is difficult; however a few people think it is easy to change organisational culture. As Chu (2003) stated that organizational culture is contributed to change. In his opinion, organisational culture can collect different values and actions to form a frame to guide the behaviour of members within an organisation. In other words, organisational culture can shape what employees do in the company and control tendency of company. For example, a company may have employees who are unwilling to change and who are conductive to change, if managers recruit staff that are innovated and willing to change, they may be the new power to change organisational culture. Therefore, to form a â€Å"change† culture can make changing organisational culture easier. However, it is also difficult to establish an organisational culture. It is need to experience a long time and face lots of difficult and challenges. According to levels of cultural analysis (Wood 2004), it shows how difficult to form the organisational culture, especially the deepest level of cultural analysis: common assumption. Common assumptions are to collect truths that organisational employees shares as a result of their common experiences and that direct beliefs and behaviours. It is extremely hard to isolate these modes, but it is interpret why culture is full of organisational life. It is hard to shape common assumptions if members of the organisation do not experience same ups and downs or cooperate long time. As Ferrara-Love (1997) stated that organizational culture does not appear in a night. On the contrary, organisational culture evolves during the time, and is the collective beliefs of individuals who worked together. Therefore, it is hard to establish organisational culture, to say nothing of changing organisational culture. At the same time, it is debatable to recruit plenty employees when the company want to change organisational culture. The new power is unstable to the company. It is hard for managers to control the new employees and it still need to cost much time. To conclude, it is difficult to change organisational culture. Organisational culture plays an ineradicable role to different kinds of organisational behaviours and members within organisations. Thus, it is always failure if certain problems of organisational culture were not being considered. Moreover, if managers want to change organisational culture which focuses on shared values or beliefs, it will be more difficult; because on the deepest of organisational culture, it formed invisible and omnipresent old guard or power which makes organisational change failure. As Locus and Kline (2008) stated that organizations always appear â€Å"learning disability† and â€Å"defensive routines† which obstruct the learning and organizational change. It shows the strong of conservative power. When managers try to change the organizational culture, they always face opposition. What was worse, the conservative power always important to the organisation. They make huge contribution to the company, which used to promote the development of company. Therefore, they play an important role to organisation. It is difficult for managers to challenge their authority. Moreover, the reason people do not want to change is the nature of people. People are easy to be used to do one thing and do not want to accept new thing. They are afraid of the unknown thing after change. As Ferrara-Love (1997) stated that people are comfortable with exist ways to finish the work. In their opinion, change is just the threat to their peaceful. Thus, they do not want to change organisational culture and dispute to change. It is obvious that changing organisational culture is so difficult. Leadership is the key to change organisational culture. The achievements of an organisation mostly depend on the leadership of managers. As Fishman and Kavanaugh (1989) stated that the culture of an organization and how employees want to change was formed substantially by leader. For example, if managers uphold to change organisational culture steady and have enough ability to direct staff, it will achieve maximum results with little effort to change organisational culture. Thus, managers are the guidance of the company; they are main factor to change organisational culture. Clement (1994) also expounded that management leadership is basic factor in a major organisational change effort. From this, it can be seen that the importance of leadership in change organisational culture. However, it is hard to change managers. If managers are not satisfied with their employees, employees can be changed, but managers will not changed unless the company go bankrupt. Thus, the most difficult to change organisational culture is to change the mind of managers. For instance, if managers make no attempt to make progress and milk-toast, it will be the most resistance to change organisational change. For this reason, the best way to change is from up to bottom. At the same time, change the mind and ability of leader is the difficult demand for changing organisational culture. To change organisational culture, managers have lot of things to do it. The role of managers is very important through up down system. As Ott (1989) suggested that the leader can do lots of things included staff selection, socialization, removal of deviating members, cultural communication and role model to guide behaviour. For example, managers can choose employees who will support to change organisational culture. Although it will not change the situation directly, they can be the power push the step of changing organisational culture. In the same way, managers can fire part of staff who opposes to change. It is not only reducing resistance to change organisational culture, but also overawe the opponent to change their minds. Furthermore, managers need to be the role model to change organisational culture. The behaviour of managers can be the maximum power to guide behaviour of managers. For example, when managers try to change organisational culture but not to do anything to change it, employees will not follow managers with any anxiety. To sum up, it is important to be the role model of changing organisational culture for managers. Furthermore, communication is an important tool for managers to change organisational culture. According to Fry (2003), he examined that leadership as motivation to change; managers need to communicate with employees about their feelings. In other words, managers should get in touch with employees and let them know core values of changing organisational culture and the need of changing organisational culture. The employees may understand the determination of managers and why to change organisational culture. Then, they can have their decision about changing organisational culture. In this way, it can reduce the distance between managers and employees, and let employees think they are also the participants to change organisational culture, they are not insignificant. When employees think they are the part of changing organisational culture, they will follow managers and try their best to help managers. At the same time, managers communicate with employees also can understand what employees think about and then do well about interactive. In addition, it can reduce the fear of employees about unknown future. As Kanter, Stein and Jick (1992) stated that communication is basic tool within any change process and failure to change always because of the feeling uncertain and anxious about their future. Thus, communication is very significant for managers to change organizational culture. In addition, to help employees to change organisational culture, managers need to teach them related skills and knowledge to work differently. As Ke and Wei (2007) suggested that employees thought to learn skills and knowledge as their main responsibility. Thus, employees may accept skills and knowledge easier than accept directly new culture. When they understand how to do, it may easy for them to accept to change organisational culture. At the same time, it is also the good way to remove their fear to uncertain future. When they master relevant skills and knowledge, they will be confident to deal with change of organisational culture. In this way, they will not fight against to change organisational culture as before. Then they can be the power help to change organisational culture. The most important things to change organisational culture are to change origin perception and beliefs. According to the definition of organisational culture, if managers want to change organisational culture, they must change shared values. The same as Whitely (1995) said that, managers need to be able to help employees to remove the past values which are not consistent with current shared vision of future organizational arrangements. The shared values and beliefs are keys of the organisational culture. Thus, managers need to change origin values of employees to change organisational culture. For example, managers can change new uniform to show the new the new appearance of company. According to Wood (2006), managers can create processes, systems and ways of working that enable to put the new values into practice. The new values can take place of the past one. In addition, managers can recruit and select new employees to help change origin values. As Harris and Metallinos (2002) stated that new employees were outside the company who did not affect by origin organizational culture, thus they were easy to accept new culture. That is why managers to select new employees to enlarge the power to change organizational culture. The new values and beliefs can be brought into the company in this way. In the same way, managers can retrain employees and engraft new rules to them, although it will not have better effect than new employees, it also can help to change organizational culture. In a word, managers need to create new values and beliefs to substitute origin one. Technology change also can promote to change organisational change. Although Weick (1990) thought technology change may make people anxiety about the values of new technology to their work, the new technology is the progress to organisational culture. There is no doubt technology change may improve work efficiency which may improve organisational culture. As Harris and Metallinos (2002) suggested that the application of new technology and subsequent development of system would promote standardization. The implementation of new technology can make employees understand new things which break routine. It also can be the sally port to open the mind of employees, let them know advantages of changing. When they can accept technology change, it is easy for them to support to change organisational change. Thus, managers can first bring in advanced technology to improve organisational change. Then teaching them to learn about it and establish new values in this process. This essay introduces what are the organisational culture and two main parts of organisational culture, the reason why changing organisational culture is difficult and how managers do to change it. This essay support to change organisational culture is so difficult because of the fear of unknown and difficult process to form organisational culture.