Plagiarism Essay

We sat in the leathers seats our principle had provided for us wondering if the choice I had made was the right one. I had two options: Should my group cope with the consequences, or should my friend take all the blame? We sat across from our principal as he finally questioned us:

"Why are you all here?"

I adjusted my glasses and responed, "We are here to talk to you about plagiarism."

A feeling of tenebrosity fell over me as I came to think about the experience. One of our classmates, an extremely bright student capable of achieving excellent grades without cheating, had cribbed a full lab report from the internet for our life sciences assignment. Hes was a friend of mine and we were often lab partners who enjoyed engaging in further inquiry of the subjects we were learning in class. A week earlier I had sat at my desk reading his lab report, growing evermore frustrated and angry. The level of analysis, research and investigation the paper had so greatly eclipsed anything he could have come up with on his own. No 8th grader in the entire school I knew could write as he had, and it did not seem to be written in his style. My classmates and I had spent hours upon hours working on the same report that we soon discovered he had simply copied and pasted from different websites.

I feel I am naturally empathetic person and know the limits of myself and my friends. I have made some great thought into the event, and in the begining, I sure my friend and I would agree to keep this matter personal. When I approached him about this, he refused to accept his intolerable behaviour. I suggested he simply redo the report on his own and turn in a new draft late, but he dismissed the offer and denied having plagiarized any part of his essay. His complete ignorance toward my restraint of telling the principal vexed me and made me think whether he was deserving of another chance. All the people I had asked for advice: my parents, my friends, even a teachis, but unfortunately they hadall given me different suggestions. All told me to confront the principal so he could face the proper consequences, but non one knew the special friendly connection I shared with him. I myself had made ridiculous mistakes in my past, and I have learned from them without the punishments from someone else. But this plagiarism was so blatant and so alarming, it was hard to forget about especially after the principle had spoken to us about the sode of ethics our school had adopted.

As we sat in listneing in our principal's office, we sat fickle minded about whether to complain about our friend. But I came to realization after looking at the big picture. My friend who had plagiarized was cheating his classmates, himself, and our school. In Iife, I have been told and know the most important value is honesty. In every situation, the individual has the responsibility to make the chocie, the right choice in a challenging circumstance. He was unwilling to listen to any of us, knowing that terrible ramifications that will build up against him will greatly affect us too. So we made the difficult decision.

Our discussion with the principle ended, and he told us, "You were at right coming to me in this confusing time." My friend was reprimanded later that day. I dreaded the confrontation with him next, but when it finally happened, he told me, "Im sorry I put our group through so much difficulty." I responded, "I am sorry too." We embraced each others apologies and knew the altercation had come to an end. I always knew we did the right thing, but it didnt always feel thatway.