Hi

Does anyone have any thoughts on helping with the research and write up of student term papers? I know a lot of VA's advertise this service but is this really ethical? Is it a form of cheating or a innovative use of resources available to the student? Does anyone do this kind of work or have any advice when taking on clients?

Thanks

Having worked really hard to get my Master's degree whilst juggling work etc I definitely wouldn't be writing peoples papers. I just don't think it's fair to the students who work hard to complete the work themselves. I've noticed lots of people on Odesk advertising for people to do this - I wouldn't.

Just my 2 cents worth.

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RESULTS Virtual Assistant
www.resultsva.com

Originally Posted by Carol_Crompton

Having worked really hard to get my Master's degree whilst juggling work etc I definitely wouldn't be writing peoples papers. I just don't think it's fair to the students who work hard to complete the work themselves. I've noticed lots of people on Odesk advertising for people to do this - I wouldn't. Just my 2 cents worth.

My personal opinion is the same as yours. I worked extremely hard for my Masters and Doctorate and feel that one important learning outcome of a Masters is to be able to collate your thoughts and research and write the results coherently and appropriately yourself. Other people I have spoken to says that getting VA's to help is becoming almost the norm in the US and Canada and that to turn a request for help down would be losing genuine regular business.

I worked for a university for 10 years as an administrative assistant. When dealing with term papers, dissertations etc. We had a plagiarism committee review each paper. You can type them up from the written information you are provided from the student. That's it. Doing their research and writing it in your own words can hurt a student in the long run. When they go to present their papers and/or do their dissertation, they are not as knowledgeable as they should be to test out. Most get caught. So yes you can offer to type it but not to do the research on it nor write it for them.

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Action Jackson Virtual Assistant|

I offer typing services for COMPLETED term papers, etc. but I WON'T do the work involved in creating the paper. If the student isn't doing the work, they aren't learning. And, if they are too lazy to do the work, they don't deserve the degree!

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Lily Chambers, The Virtual Office Goddess, LLC
Author "How to Do Your Own Small Business Bookkeeping"

Hi Ladies,

I fully agree with you. As a student, I have often thought, "it would be great if I could get someone else to write this", but in the long run, it would not have been beneficial to my overall learning and skill development. Also, when presenting the paper, you simply are not as knowledgeable about the subject matter and some professors ask questions that are not in your paper, but you would have come across the answer in your related research.

So, no, I would not do the research (that's a lot of work) and write the paper, only type it up and copy edit.

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Tracy Jones

As a Professor now, I would not advise anyone to do this. The student might night realize it then, but they can very easily get caught.

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Tamika R. Johnson, MBA, Principal
administrative partners, llc
www.administrativepartners.net | http://adminpartners.blogspot.com

I wholeheartedly agree with not doing this unless it is already written out and only needed to be typed up and formatting done. Cheating is never a good road to travel. It reflects back on us as VAs and our high standards of promoting ethical practices.

Just my 2-cents.

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Jules, SunRise Virtual Solutions - WordPress Customization & XHTML/CSS Web Sites

Thanks everyone for your thoughts on this. Having supported professors and worked my **** off for a doctorate, I agree with your comments totally. I just wanted to get other VA's opinions in case there was something I hadn't thought about.

I suppose if the subject the student is studying is in your field, then it might be ok to offer some general subject feedback too - a kind of mentor service similar to a subject supervisor. However, in these cases maybe they should think about referencing you as a resource depending on the level of feedback. This track maybe a fine line though so perhaps best to steer clear

Overall, it seems like the fairest service to offer is a basic editing and typing service.

Back when I was in college, I did do research work, but just in gathering information for a student, not writing anything. I'd do periodical and newspaper searches, pull the information and photocopy it for the student. It's up to them to actually read the information and write the paper. And, of course, I typed papers (way back before the day of personal computers), and corrected grammar and writing problems.

I hadn't thought of offering that sort of service. I live in a college town, so probably should advertise that as a service. Not the research, because most of that is on-line now and it's not really a time savings for them to have someone do periodical searches for them like it was in the 80s. But typing and editing papers could definitely bring in some business.

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Jodith Allen
Administrative Arts