Students who consider using the Internet as a method of academic dishonesty should second guess themselves before they click twice.

There are many sites, such as www.plagiarism.org, designed for professors to find out if work has been forged.

Rosemary Johnsen a visiting assistant English professor at MSU, said she did not used to be concerned with students taking work off the Internet.

That was until last semester - when she caught a student in the act.

“I checked it out because it was so obviously not the student’s own work,” she said. “It was really easy to find. The same thing that made it easy for him to find what he used made it easy for me as well.”

To prevent other students from this cheating or plagiarizing, Johnsen said she’s trying different methods this semester.

She warned her students at the beginning of class and made assignments narrower and more specific to make it harder to find something ready-made.

But a recent survey finds that it’s not just Johnsen’s students who are handing in copied work.

A study done by Rutgers University found that 72 percent of college students used papers from the Internet as their own work.

But Don McCabe, the founding president of the Center of Academic Integrity at Duke University who conducted Rutgers’ first survey 10 years ago and has done so regularly since, said there are some misconceptions with the percentages of students who face academic dishonesty.

“Most people believe the Internet has caused percentages to rise dramatically, and I don’t happen to believe that,” he said. “People are starting to use the Internet in ways people used the library - but it is more convenient and much more anonymous.”

And McCabe cites the younger generation as a possible source of problems, saying high school students are becoming quite familiar with navigating themselves around the Internet.

He said some high school students, while doing research projects, tend to not be aware of how to cite sources. However, at the college level, students should know better than to turn in such work, he said.

McCabe, who’s also a marketing professor at Rutgers University, has worked to help other professors reduce academic dishonesty. Explaining the rules to students up front is one approach, he said. Making sure assignments are made to ensure students are learning is another approach.

MSU Ombudsman Stan Soffin, who serves as a liaison between faculty and students, said both parties should be open about academic dishonesty.

“I believe faculty and students should have frank discussions and make clear what MSU’s rules and policies are,” he said.

According to the Integrity of Scholarship and Grades All-University Policy, any MSU student caught cheating or plagiarizing may receive a 0.0 on the assignment and a 0.0 for the course. Depending on the seriousness of the case, a dean can refer the case to the University Academic Integrity Review Board for possible disciplinary action.

The board can either issue a warning, place a student on warning probation, hand down disciplinary probation or suspend a student.

Diane Waryold, the executive director of the Center of Academic Integrity at Duke University, said better technology has simply made it easier for students to pass forged work off as their own.

“If students are in a bind for time and they are doing research on the Internet - and here it is, here’s the paper,” she said. “Temptation and access have made it easier in a less ethical way.”

Fortunately for Erik Lunde, an American Thought and Language professor at MSU, his students haven’t been cheating on assignments in his classes.

And even though the Internet is tempting, in terms of cheating, he encourages Web research but insists all his students cite their sources.

“I have been fortunate so far,” he said.

Since the Internet is so widely available on campus, marketing freshman Sean Temple said he understands why students would cheat.

“I use the Internet for research and things like that,” he said. “I would not cheat because it’s hard to get away with - but I see where people could.

“With things like other classes and social lives, I see how pressures can build. But they are screwing themselves in the long run.”

Rachel Wright can be reached at wrightr9@msu.edu.