KCL - suspected plagiarism

I have been suspected of plagiarism of one of my final year exam essays (50% similarity to other submissions) it was an open book exam and so the only thing I used was my notes that I had made from the lecture, This is the first time I have ever been suspected of plagiarism and I have been invited to a meeting called a local academic misconduct procedure (LAMP) meeting to discuss the essay. I am really worried about the outcome and was wondering if anyone has gone through this before and if so what was the outcome.

There are a few outcomes one of which included poor academic practice, would my case constitute this?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!

When it says "50% similar to other submissions" I am assuming that this means that your essay is more than 50% similar to at least one other essay written in the same exam. If you took your own notes in with you, it's hard to see how this has happened. Did you use any materials made available to the whole class?

Hello.
Best thing you can do is not panic. Stressing yourself out will get you nowhere.
If you have not plagiarised, then you have nothing to worry about; do not let anyone accuse you of something you did not do, you are a legal adult and you can if they're your own notes, prove your competentcy verbally over the subject material.

Another thing to remember for the future, even if the exam is open book try to do some of it without using your notes.
I know it sounds stupid, but open book exams can be worse than closed book ones, as it's near impossible to plagiairize in a monitored closed book exam. It's however very easy for students to plagiarise in open book exams. So any "high percentage" to your marker will automatically be questioned.

Regarding the notes you used from the lectures... The notes that your lecturers use most of the time are works from online and scholary academic sources. These sources are published and most of them are accesible to softwares like Turnitin and SafeAssign's databases; so if you've used lecture notes, and they're similar to what's already been written, the overall similarity score will be high.

If you do most of your work from the top of your head and try to credit ideas you use (e.g. Smith argues this....), then most likely your similarity scores will be lower. You'll also be citing where you got the notes from; so no one can accuse you of 'plagiairsm'.
So try not to use your notes in the future. Revise well and if you need to, refer back to them with a quick glance for open book exams.

As said before don't panic, similarities are inevitable sometimes.
I remember my frist University submission came back in the middle end of the green scale to "past student papers" (around 10-11%), and I'd used my own ideas and cited all the other stuff I'd paraphrased. I couldn't help that. It was a coursework paper on a subject that had been done to death, so some of the stuff I'd mentioned had been written probably thousands of times before by other students. Nothing ever came of it though.

Try not to worry, and prepare your argument well.
You are innocent until proven guilty! Don't let anyone tell you otherwise!

Please let us know how it goes.

Hi,
Thank you for your reassurance and kind words. I had absolutely no intention to plagiarise and I think that as I used the recording to make my notes and then the notes to write my essay, other students did the same thing and that's why I have a high similarity score. I am just really hoping that they will not escalate this further as I have an offer to study a masters and if I get a 0 or have to retake the exam I don't think I will be able to enrol as resits would take place after graduation (around august). I'll try to update you on what happens.

Hello again.

It's no problem.
I believe you don't worry. I have heard of people in your situation before but it's mainly been first or second year Uni students.
I can't really advise you any further with what may happen, all I can tell you is that you are in no way a blatant plagiarist. The worst they can brand you as is someone who used similar note/resource material as potentially a few dozen other students.
It will hopefully be fine, just keep a cool head, stand tall and don't let anyone brand you as anything negative in the LAMP.
Explain to them the situation, and ensure you plan a defence to give them.
Please do update me, it's definitley a not great situation to be in.
I wish you all the luck in the world, try not to worry.

Thank you so much, I am definitely trying to stay calm. I have contacted my personal tutor and the advisor department of my student union, so hopefully, they will be able to give me more advice on the situation. I hope everything goes well!

Well did you plagiarise? Only be worried if you did - plagiarism is like a crime to universities.

thats what someone from LAMP would ask

I have been suspected of plagiarism of one of my final year exam essays (50% similarity to other submissions) it was an open book exam and so the only thing I used was my notes that I had made from the lecture, This is the first time I have ever been suspected of plagiarism and I have been invited to a meeting called a local academic misconduct procedure (LAMP) meeting to discuss the essay. I am really worried about the outcome and was wondering if anyone has gone through this before and if so what was the outcome.

There are a few outcomes one of which included poor academic practice, would my case constitute this?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!

hey, just wondering how soon after the exams or results did they tell you you have been suspected?

I have been suspected of plagiarism of one of my final year exam essays (50% similarity to other submissions) it was an open book exam and so the only thing I used was my notes that I had made from the lecture, This is the first time I have ever been suspected of plagiarism and I have been invited to a meeting called a local academic misconduct procedure (LAMP) meeting to discuss the essay. I am really worried about the outcome and was wondering if anyone has gone through this before and if so what was the outcome.

There are a few outcomes one of which included poor academic practice, would my case constitute this?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!

do you have an update on this? in a similar situation myself for memorising information from online publications and using it in a close-book exam. did not know plagiarism extended to exams ☹️ I hold an offer to do a master's at oxford so need to maintain a clean record / first class grade...

do you have an update on this? in a similar situation myself for memorising information from online publications and using it in a close-book exam. did not know plagiarism extended to exams ☹️ I hold an offer to do a master's at oxford so need to maintain a clean record / first class grade...

do you have an update on this? in a similar situation myself for memorising information from online publications and using it in a close-book exam. did not know plagiarism extended to exams ☹️ I hold an offer to do a master's at oxford so need to maintain a clean record / first class grade...

Of course it does - baffling that you'd get to third year not knowing this! If you can recall the info, you can recall where you read it.

Yours sounds like a much more cut and dry example of plagiarism than the OP's did - your best bet is to be honest about it, but in third year the penalties can be pretty heavy. Good luck.

"of course it does" how?? if a question ask for a definition of something, do you source where you get the definiton from or do you just answer it normally?