Response to a plagiarist

Another kid has been caught plagiarizing me, but this one has posted this apology in the comments of the essay he/she plagiarized:

Anonymous said...

Dear Teacherrefpoet...
I am a student who plagerized your own essay as my own. I was asked to apologize to you, and I truly do believe that you deserve my apology. Im sorry, and I know that what I did was completely wrong, and there is no excuse for any of it. I know that plagerism is a huge problem, and I am so sorry for using your words as my own.

Here's my response:

Dear Edmonton student,

I appreciate and accept your apology. I'm glad to hear that you recognize that you're wrong. Good kids can do bad things. I don't want to be judged exclusively on my worst actions, and you deserve the same benefit of the doubt. I will assume that you're better than this bad thing you've done. Shake it off and move on--but I'd like it if you moved on with this in your head.

For starters, you should be grateful that you have a teacher who cares enough about your learning that he/she took the time to investigate when he/she believed you plagiarized. It's not possible to learn--about writing, about Pleasantville, about the really interesting issues in the movie, or about anything else--by cutting and pasting something from the internet. Your own thoughts are undoubtedly far more interesting and important to your teacher than mine are. In spite of that, for your own reasons, you denied yourself an opportunity to learn and to communicate with a teacher who obviously cares about you. You did this to get points and a grade. I won't deny the importance of points and grades--we as teachers use them to try to promote better work out of students. But learning trumps everything, including grades. Your actions indicate that you'd rather get a good grade than learn. Trust me when I say that that kind of attitude has long-term consequences that make people less happy.

To put it another way, while I'm annoyed that you stole my ideas and words and claimed that they were your own, I'm more concerned that you've missed out on an opportunity to write something uniquely yours. I'd rather write something fairly crappy that I own than claim somebody else's work, even if it got me an A.

Please learn from this. Plagiarism is a problem, but it's not one you can solve. You can solve your own problems, however. Seek help, work hard, do your best, and enjoy the results, letting the grades serve as indicators of your own progress rather than as the paycheck you get for turning in words on a page. Only then does education really become fun on a personal level, and that's a feeling I love as much as any feeling in the world. If you think back in your life, I'm sure you love it too. Make decisions that lead you back to that feeling, not away from it.

Best of luck from here. Thanks for the apology.

--TRP