Plagiarism rife among Dominican students

posted on: Mar 8 2010 11:16 by Royston. Viewed 186 times.


A recent study has suggested plagiarism is common in theses produced by Dominican students. The University of Santo Domingo (UASD) has found as much as 80% of work by post grad. and under grad students  includes significant elements copied from other authors.

Professor Génove Gneco said that fraud occurs in public and private institutions, and that the frequency is in greater evidence in economics and social sciences, humanities, legal sciences, engineering, medicine and science.

Franklin García Fermín, rector of the UASD, said the situation had reached worrying levels, and  revealed that specific cases involving lecturers were under investigation.

The digital review of papers and theses submitted this year looked at 16,433 titles, 7,888 of them in private universities. It revealed that in 80% of these there is evidence of full or partial plagiarism.
According to Gneco, about 7000 students will graduate this year based, at least partially, on fraudulent work.

"The frequency of plagiarism is over 60% and averages to more than 80%," concluded Gneco who has reviewed some 25 thousand theses and monographs.

The problem is exacerbated by companies offering help with graduate and post graduate work for fees of  RD$20,000 to RD$30,000.

The rector of the UASD warned that the institution has mechanisms to identify any work that is found to have been obtained through improper and inappropriate actions and he revealed that for years the state university has pursued these businesses that offer “help” with degrees.

He clarified that the problem affects all universities, especially where students have greater purchasing power.

The president of the Association of University Presidents, Angel Hernandez,  favored higher education institutions implementing mechanisms to monitor the possibility of fraud at undergraduate and postgraduate level. Hernandez also blames the internet for offering many opportunities for students to lift entire texts from other works.

The  president of the Open University for Adults (UAPA) attributes the problem to failures in the monitoring process and preparation of work, and suggests that any student preparing a thesis must have a guardian to oversee the process.

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