My friend is submitting a plagiarised PS :(

EDIT: After different views nearer the end, I managed to contact her tonight and tried to speak nicely about the situation. She’s denying that she copied or even looked at any other personal statements and says she won’t withdraw it or try for a new statement. She doesn’t seem to believe that UCAS has methods to check for similarity even after showing her a link one of the users here posted. I know she isn’t happy with this but I feel better than what I did keeping it to myself, it is her choice and I feel like I've done what I should have done a few days back.. Thanks for all your input here :smile:

My friend and I have both applied for Adult Nursing in various universities and before she submitted her application she sent me her PS because she wanted feedback and thoughts. It sounds a little unpleasant but I instantly noticed the language and the method it was written in the PS was at a much higher level that what she could speak or write so I doubted all of it was hers. I googled different parts of it and chunks and chunks of both sentences and paragraphs have been taken directly from personal statement example websites.. I highlighted all I could find online and a horrible 50% of it is not her words.. I'm very shocked and left in an awkward position because she is a close friend of mine.

I know she chose to do this but the worst part is she has already sent it off so I feel helpless here, should I keep quiet and leave the situation to run its course? I feel speaking up would be pointless at this stage.

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 1

bluemadhatter

20

I think you should talk to her about it and tell her how this could potential ruin her entire future :erm:

Reply 2

Alexion

17

Original post by Nanodae

I know she chose to do this but the worst part is she has already sent it off so I feel helpless here, should I keep quiet and leave the situation to run its course? I feel speaking up would be pointless at this stage.

Nothing that can be done now :closedeyes:

It's gonna come back from UCAS when they discover it's plagiarised, and her whole application will be DQd.

She can say goodbye to going to university next year... :nah:

Reply 3

TheonlyMrsHolmes

19

Original post by bluemadhatter

I think you should talk to her about it and tell her how this could potential ruin her entire future :erm:

Lol that would be a start!

Reply 4

TheonlyMrsHolmes

19

I don't know why people still do this, I mean I have heard the plagiarism warning over 1000 times.

Reply 5

username1500433

3

I don't think you should talk to her about it, then she'll know that you didn't trust that it was her writing. Just let her suffer the consequences, there is nothing you can really do now anyway.

Reply 6

Ethereal Consort

3

Nah just leave it. It's all done now.. Usually on ucas-track it will say at the bottom of the summary of the application if there had been any similarities found with other personal statements. But still it's one of those things that she'll have to learn the hard way

Reply 7

claireestelle

22

Being dishonest is not what a nurse should be so I m afraid your friend will have to learn the hard way.

Reply 8

0123456543210

2

Original post by Alexion

Nothing that can be done now :closedeyes:

It's gonna come back from UCAS when they discover it's plagiarised, and her whole application will be DQd.

She can say goodbye to going to university next year... :nah:

And the year after the next year and so on, dishonesty is not something that universities look forward to generally and especially in the profession where being dishonest or negligent can potentially deprive someone of life. Natural selection at its best, she can forget an idea of studying at a university, let alone get into nursing :broken:

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 9

Asurat

17

Original post by bluemadhatter

I think you should talk to her about it and tell her how this could potential ruin her entire future :erm:

How will that help anything? Her friend is condemned now as it's already been sent off.

Reply 10

troubadour.

19

All I can say is that your friend must be crazy -- in 2015, there's no way that she can reasonably expect to get away with copy/pasting her personal statement from exemplar statements on the Internet. I suggest you pretend you don't know anything about it and then just comfort her when she inevitably gets rejected by all her universities.

Reply 11

returnmigrant

21

She will get caught.

Cheating is something UCAS and all the Universities take very seriously.
For a professional course like Nursing, Unis are unlikely to continue with her application.
End of.

Reply 12

troubadour.

19

Original post by 0123456543210

And the year after the next year and so on, dishonesty is not something that universities look forward to generally and especially in the profession where being dishonest or negligent can potentially deprive someone of life. Natural selection at its best, she can forget an idea of studying at a university, let alone get into nursing :broken:

I can imagine this being the case for nursing and other caring professions but surely it's not that serious for all subjects? At most, she might be banned from applying through UCAS for a few years. I'd be very surprised if the ban was indefinite.

Reply 13

angelcake123

14

If she has not sent it off, confront her. Ask her if it is all her own words, word for word, or if she got loadsss of 'help'?
If she has sent it off, tell her you recognise her PS was similar to many online. After all, you are both applying for the same course so its not like she would question why you read some Adult Nursing PS online.

If she has sent it off and you choose not to let her know the consequences she may face, when she does face the consequences, you are gonna have to fake the whole 'wow how was that possible?'. Of course she knew what she was doing but maybe she thought she was being subtle. At least this way she will be prepared for what is yet to come.

If you reckon 50% of it was plagiarised, then she has no chance of getting away with it because I think anything more than 10% is picked up by the system.

Reply 14

celloel

20

If she's dumb enough to plagiarise her personal statement, then she's too dumb to become a nurse. Don't tell her - there's nothing that can be done and she'll probably end up misdirecting her anger at you. Just comfort her when she gets rejected for plagiarism.

Reply 15

PharaohFromSpace

16

Original post by Nanodae

My friend and I have both applied for Adult Nursing in various universities and before she submitted her application she sent me her PS because she wanted feedback and thoughts. It sounds a little unpleasant but I instantly noticed the language and the method it was written in the PS was at a much higher level that what she could speak or write so I doubted all of it was hers. I googled different parts of it and chunks and chunks of both sentences and paragraphs have been taken directly from personal statement example websites.. I highlighted all I could find online and a horrible 50% of it is not her words.. I'm very shocked and left in an awkward position because she is a close friend of mine, and it is a shame to think what could happen to her :frown:

I know she chose to do this but the worst part is she has already sent it off so I feel helpless here, should I keep quiet and leave the situation to run its course? I feel speaking up would be pointless at this stage.

If she really is your close friend, I think you should ask her if it is her work, I mean if it was me I'd tell my friends and they wouldn't be offended but would be quite happy that they improved.
Also maybe there is a 0. 01% chance that it is her work? (If she insists)

I also might sound like a douche for asking this, but have UCAS found out? I want to know if all if those warnings actually mean anything.

Reply 16

RayApparently

21

That is a very, very bad situation. This:

Original post by angelcake123

If she has not sent it off, confront her. Ask her if it is all her own words, word for word, or if she got loadsss of 'help'?
If she has sent it off, tell her you recognise her PS was similar to many online. After all, you are both applying for the same course so its not like she would question why you read some Adult Nursing PS online.

If she has sent it off and you choose not to let her know the consequences she may face, when she does face the consequences, you are gonna have to fake the whole 'wow how was that possible?'. Of course she knew what she was doing but maybe she thought she was being subtle. At least this way she will be prepared for what is yet to come.

If you reckon 50% of it was plagiarised, then she has no chance of getting away with it because I think anything more than 10% is picked up by the system.

Reply 17

troubadour.

19

Original post by angelcake123

If you reckon 50% of it was plagiarised, then she has no chance of getting away with it because I think anything more than 10% is picked up by the system.

The system picks up any and all similarities with previous personal statements (which UCAS keeps in a database) and anything on the Internet and sends the figure to the universities applied to. The universities then decide what to do with it. For medicine at UCL (which I've applied for) in particular, the auto-reject threshold is 30 percent similarity, I think.

Reply 18

angelcake123

14

Original post by Hydeman

The system picks up any and all similarities with previous personal statements (which UCAS keeps in a database) and anything on the Internet and sends the figure to the universities applied to. The universities then decide what to do with it. For medicine at UCL (which I've applied for) in particular, the auto-reject threshold is 30 percent similarity, I think.