Attitude to plagiarism in different European countries
Plagiarism is an important and frequently discussed issue, which may have severe financial impacts for higher education institutions across Europe. However, there are different attitudes to this topic in different countries. Whereas ECTS aims to provide an objective measurement of student effort allowing students to spend part of their studies at different institutions and even different countries, the penalties for plagiarism and other types of cheating may be different. Even the definition of plagiarism may be understood differently in particular European countries. One of the aims of the project IPPHEAE is to identify these differences and try to find common solutions for related problems.The aim of the paper is to present results of research focused on attitudes to plagiarism in Great Britain, Czech Republic, Poland, Lithuania, Cyprus and Bulgaria. A questionnaire survey was conducted in these countries among students and teachers. The results are interesting and inspiring and show huge differences in attitude to plagiarism between western and post-communist countries, surprisingly including the Czech Republic in the group of western countries.
Do students think what teachers think about plagiarism
Preventing students' plagiarism is an important issue at Higher Education Institutions (HEI) since teachers are the ones who are primarily involved in plagiarism prevention. They have to explain to students what plagiarism is and to teach them how to avoid plagiarism. A survey conducted under the research project on the Impact of Policies for Plagiarism in Higher Education Across Europe (IPPHEAE) has collected thousands of questionnaires from both students and teachers of several HEIs at various EU countries. The project addressed several research questions relating to plagiarism. This paper compares and contrasts the overall data collected on students’ and teachers' attitude towards academic writing and their perception of plagiarism and plagiarism penalties as well as their knowledge of institutional policy/procedures on plagiarism. On the basis of the results obtained it would appear that changes in teachers’ attitude and a better understanding of students' educational needs and perception of plagiarism may provide the means to enable HEIs to help students to avoid plagiarism in a more effective way.
Science fairs as learning tool for teaching excellence
Science fairs are usually considered to be a pedagogical and cultural activity that involves the students actively. Gifted students need challenges to further develop their skills while maintaining the motivation level. Science fairs may provide the informal environment that will request and allow these students of excellence to challenge themselves by developing a scientific research project. Despite being well known in different countries, in Portugal first steps are being made on the use and implementation of science fairs as effective pedagogical tool. In this work, we will present a 4 years study that was developed on a Portuguese school with the main goal of evaluating the advantages of this informal way of teaching. The study includes an analysis of the evolution of the students’ knowledge that have participated, or visited, the different science fairs. Some advices for the implementation of these projects will be given. The motivation of the students was monitored as well as the knowledge and skills effectively improved by this activity.