Guidance as to what is and isn't acceptable

Through their lessons and conversations with teachers, students will have had it made clear how to avoid plagarism and how to behave appropriately in tests and exams. Issues connected to plagarism and exam misconduct are usually easy to understand and accept.

It is more difficult to understand the difference between collusion and reasonable help.

A simple way to explain collusion is when help changes the work from being that which the student could produce themself.

Teachers have to be very careful to avoid collusion and so do parents, other family members, tutors and friends. If you have a tutor working with a student we would advise that you share this page with them.

Examples of reasonable help

Below are some examples of reasonable help to guide conversations with students

Issue: the research question is expressed differently in three places (the title page, the introduction and the conclusion).

Comment: is your research question consistent through the essay, including on the title page?

Issue: the essay rambles and the argument is not clear.

Comment: your essay lacks clarity here. How might you make it clearer?

Issue: the student has made a mistake in their calculations.

Comment: check this page carefully.

Issue: the student has left out a section of the essay.

Comment: you are missing something here. What is it? Check the essay against the requirements.

Issue: the essay places something in the appendix that should be in the body of the essay.

Comment: are you sure this belongs here?

Issue: the conclusion is weak.

Comment: what is it that you are trying to say here? Have you included all your relevant findings? Have you looked at unanswered questions?

Issue: the essay has an incomplete citation.

Comment: you need to check this page for accuracy of referencing.

As can be seen, reasonable help relies on open ended questions and instructions which allow the student to produce their own work.

Examples of Collusion

The following is a list of some of the things which would be considered collusion

• Correction of spelling and punctuation.

• Correction of experimental work or mathematics.

• Re-writing of any of the work

• Indicating where whole sections of the work would be better placed.

• Proofreading the work for errors.

• Correcting bibliographies or citations.