By Lucy Caulkett-
The chairman of the Open University has been told to institute a coherent framework with the higher education institution after student of the Open University was forced to repeat the year over alleged plagiarism after she had been provided a high score in one of the modules by one her lecturers at the end of 2022.
Baroness Lane Fox(pictured) has the task of addressing potential systemic failings in how its institution assesses and treats students who feel they have been treated badly without any accountability or redress.
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Baroness Fox entered the House of Lords as a crossbencher on 26 March 2013, becoming its youngest female member; she was appointed Chancellor of the Open University on 12 March 2014, and is a respected figure in academia. There needs to be greater transparency and accountability in the way those working under her authority administer its disciplinary procedures.
An investigation by The Eye Of Media.Com suggests the Open university has failed to abide by the rules of its own plagiarism policies and subjected the lady to unfair treatment, whose identity we have anonymised for this story.
Studies with the Open university allow students to work from home over a three year period and complete their degree. All students expect to be treated fairly in the course of their studies.
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The decision for the university to penalise the student questions the integrity of The Open University higher education system, and its level of accountability when subjected to scrutiny.
The student in question had achieved second upper grades for most of her assignments in the psychology course, with no issues raised, but was failed during the last bunch of assignments she did.
As a result, she was forced to repeat the entire final year, causing her much distress.
The student, whose identity we have anonymised at her request, says the entire situation affected her mental health severely because of what appears to have bene unfair treatment against her.
The mother of one had been penalised once before in another essay, where the school deducted the percentage of plagiarism found in her assignment from her overall mark. She has not been provided a reason why the same principle was not applied to the two disputed assignments that has cost her the year.
She has been battling depression ever since, with its levels increasing as she approaches the final segment of her repeated year in which she has been forced to do five assignments again on top of a fees of £1,000. This, despite the fact only two of her assignments had plagiarism in them.
The Open University like all universities, has an Academic Conduct Policy that helps to maintain high standards of academic integrity by defining behaviour considered to be academic misconduct and what the consequences of this behaviour might be.
According to the university, ”this is important in upholding the value of The Open University degrees and safeguarding the University’s reputation to the benefit of all students and staff”.
In order to have academic integrity at The Open University means that you are committed to honest study practices and shared values that ensure your work is a true expression of your own understanding and idea you give credit to others where their work contributes to your understanding.
The particular aspect of the lady’s work allegedly plagiarised was penalised because she did not paraphrase material which she featured in her essay, despite having referenced the material.
A plagiarism check revealed an 8% and 11% plagiarism for both essays respectively. This does not match up to the level of plagiarism to warrant such a harsh penalty of repeating the year.
The authourities of the Open University were asked to justify that the decision to fail the student was proportionate, given the small amount of plagiarism discovered on her work.
However, the university declined to comment.
She was originally scored 61% for the assignment by her lecturer, the implication being that the lecturer was inept in not observing that the work had been plagiarised.
However, her assignment was later failed by the Open University after the allegation of plagiarism was raised. This meant she was not only failed for the paper, but also told she must repeat the entire year.
The student claimed to have made a complaint to the Student Complaints and Appeals Procedures, which is designed to enable aggrieved students to bring matters of concern to the attention of the University.
Representatives of the Open University told this publication that no complaint had been made, a fact later confirmed with the student, whose failure to formerly complain may provide confirmation of her mental health issues perhaps in being afraid to confront the situation with the eyes of the media on her case.
. The complaint procedure is meant to provide mechanisms through which those concerns may be resolved.
Its policy practices says ”The Open University aims to encourage you as a student to develop academic integrity by teaching pupils about good academic practice.
It states that ”demonstrating good academic practice ensures that anyone who reads your work can easily identify your own thoughts and ideas on a subject, and can distinguish these
from the thoughts and ideas of others”.
”This matters because as members of the University community, we are all committed to
openness and honesty in our words and actions. These values are essential to academic study and research. When we act with integrity, we receive the credit that we deserve for our work and others receive the credit for theirs.
”This ensures that no students have an unfair advantage, for example by receiving credit for work that is not their own.
However, this publication has seen a copy of both assignments after it was brought to our attention by a relative of hers.
The student also revealed that the picture of students is accessible to lecturers, an uncommon practise in most universities, where only the registerer retain such private details.
The news casts a dark shadow over the integrity of the Open University system.
Lack Of Accountability
The Open University does not appear to have expressed openness about its reasons for failing a student who had clearly reference sources used for her essay, and was not aware the university needed the words of the authour changed to her own words.
When probed about the matter, its press representatives pointed us to the university’s complaint section, rather than address the issue.
Other universities contacted as part of our investigation suggested its decision to fail the student was too too harsh.
Repeated requests from this publication has been met with similar generic responses in relation to the procedure for making complaints.
The student is in her final weeks of the repeated year and is so far doing well.
Yet, the unaccountability of the Open University raises questions at to whether it needs to be regulated much better.
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