If you’re a student do you need help writing your dissertation? You can’t fail to notice that number of dissertation writing services have popped up, offering to help students write their dissertations and assignments for a fee.
The guarantee is that ‘it is not plagiarised, it is originally written, and your University will not be able to detect you’ve used such a service’. The reality is somewhat different. It is likely to be a plagiarised, the words originally written won’t be your words and YES your University will be able to detect that you’ve used such a service.
It is also fraud.
You as a student have invested a huge amount of money and commitment into your course; why on earth would you devalue your investment and risk getting sent down? Why would you risk a fail?
Why would you deprive yourself of a unique experience?
Particularly when the alternative is so easy: Let your university know that you are having difficulties; this will enable them to find a way to support you.
If you are struggling your first port of call should always be your tutor. They understand the institution, marking criteria and assessments and will be able to give you the best advice.
Debbie Williams
Head of UCLan Publishing and Chair, Association for Publishing Education
Letting your university know won’t necessarily affect your immediate employment; you’ve had the publishing tutoring and, if you’ve been struggling, it will allow you complete in your own time, without a fail.
This is particularly important in publishing. Publishing dissertations have a huge value to the industry; the research cannot be underestimated. The detail and opinion of someone who is looking at the industry with fresh eyes and a different approach are often useful in discovering future possibilities. Some dissertations are worthy of being expanded into published books. Publishing is also an industry where we deal in intellectual property and copyright. Why would you pass someone else’s work off as your own, even plagiarise? By doing so, aren’t you going against some of the very foundations that publishing is built upon?. Aside from this, you are coming into an industry where writing and vocabulary are key; how does an employer know that you’re up to the job if you’ve forged your dissertation?
Whatever role you wish to play in publishing, why would you pass up this experience of being a writer yourself, and learning the process of time, commitment, frustration and the self-doubt that goes with it? You’re giving yourself Editorial and Commissioning experience. Why would you pass up this opportunity to complete a research project the many people across the industry will want to read? Key people within the publishing industry often talk to lecturers about the subjects chosen by students for they dissertations and sometimes will ask to read your dissertation if it is of particular interest.
Regardless of this, using a dissertation service is cheating and if you are a former student who writes dissertations for other students, you are committing fraud.
Both are worthy of being sent down and, if you are writing for someone else, being stripped of your PhD.
You might say, that bookcareers operates a CV and covering letter writing service, but if you’ve ever used this service you will know that we do not write your CV and Covering Letter. We teach you how to write your own, you’ll be advised as to what information to include and guided as to the best way to incorporate this; you’ll be coached on how to express your skills coherently and advised as to how well you match the requirements of the role. There are no templates to give you; there is no such thing as a ‘bookcareers CV’. We see the drafts and outlines of your documents and rarely see the finished article. Like with dissertations, it is so easy to spot when someone has used a full CV writing service.
At all times you must retain ownership of your CV and the same is required of your dissertation. It has to be your words and your documents because if you get the job, it is going to be you employed by the company, not us or the dissertation service. It is going to be you who turns up to work each day and does the job, and if you haven’t got all the skills required, it will be you who doesn’t complete probation and finds themselves unemployed again.
At the end of the day, does it matter? Yes it does matter. Don’t do it; don’t cheat, and if you are asked to write someone else’s dissertation for them, don’t commit fraud.