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allpurposewriter
Community Member

Urgent! Help me cheat!

I saw a job posting today that has many variations, but this one was really as blatant as I've ever seen. It said, "Needed urgently ... a writer to write a paper for my class." The posting then went on to explain the particulars of the paper, which, evidently (this is April) was a very specific and involved paper for a college level history class. Probably a term paper, a major part of this person's grade.

Any reaction to this? Whatever the price, is it something you do? I've seen postings for people to write someone's thesis, for chrissake. I always think, "Yeah, for $100 and a Masters degree, I'll write your thesis." 

 

I'll start off the confessions: I'm actually ghost-writing a paper for someone that seems very much like it's a school project. The client didn't say ... but I have my suspicions. Due to this, the creepiness of these assignments has been on my mind lately.

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petra_r
Community Member


Anthony H wrote:

I saw a job posting today that has many variations, but this one was really as blatant as I've ever seen. It said, "Needed urgently ... a writer to write a paper for my class."
Any reaction to this?


Click on "report as inappropriate" and report it as academic fraud, which is forbidden on Upwork.

 

Move on.

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16 REPLIES 16
petra_r
Community Member


Anthony H wrote:

I saw a job posting today that has many variations, but this one was really as blatant as I've ever seen. It said, "Needed urgently ... a writer to write a paper for my class."
Any reaction to this?


Click on "report as inappropriate" and report it as academic fraud, which is forbidden on Upwork.

 

Move on.

Aha. Did not realize. Uprwork is ahead of me here. Good to know.

 

I do read postings that sound like "academic fraud" on occassion. Must be quite a few slip between the cracks.


Anthony H wrote:

Aha. Did not realize. Uprwork is ahead of me here. Good to know.

 

I do read postings that sound like "academic fraud" on occassion. Must be quite a few slip between the cracks.


Not quite ahead of us. We have begged and pleaded for years for a specific violation-reporting category of academic fraud, and we still must write it in—and typically explain in painstaking detail the nature of the violation: the human screening of these specific reports is inadequate to the requirements of the task. The cleverer solicitations for plagiarism don't seem worth reporting, since the screeners seem so unfamiliar with academic protocol and ethics that they only "get" the most blatant violations. As a freelancer, one develops a sense.

One touchstone when prospecting: "Is there any conceivable business or social context outside of academia where the work product would have the least bit of value?" If the answer is no, there you go.

edited to add: One does not have to begin from a position of cynicism to arrive thereat after years of observing Upwork's thriving and ill-policed market for academic fraud.

Extra kudos to Douglas Michael for use of the word "thereat".  Well done!


Mary W wrote:

Extra kudos to Douglas Michael for use of the word "thereat".  Well done!


Ashamed to say I've never seen it used before today and had to Google it. Bravo Michael!


Douglas Michael M wrote:

Anthony H wrote:

Aha. Did not realize. Uprwork is ahead of me here. Good to know.

 

I do read postings that sound like "academic fraud" on occassion. Must be quite a few slip between the cracks.


Not quite ahead of us. We have begged and pleaded for years for a specific violation-reporting category of academic fraud, and we still must write it in—and typically explain in painstaking detail the nature of the violation: the human screening of these specific reports is inadequate to the requirements of the task. The cleverer solicitations for plagiarism don't seem worth reporting, since the screeners seem so unfamiliar with academic protocol and ethics that they only "get" the most blatant violations. As a freelancer, one develops a sense.


At the very least, I wish UW would allow me to add screen shots to my comments so I could explain in detail what I was looking at and why it should be investigated. Pictures seem to help. If its something I'm really concerned about, I try to put together a screenshot essay that details my thought process and I send that to one of the mods after I flag the post.

However, I have to be concerned enough about something to get past the idea that it takes a ton of my unpaid time to do this.

mwiggenhorn
Community Member

This is academic fraud.  There are many threads about it.  It is blatantly wrong to post these jobs and to actually work on them.  The job should be flagged as academic fraud and if it is that obvious, it will be taken down.  In the past, FLs who are adamant about the wrong-ness of these jobs have actually contacted the professor and/or the Dean of the school that the fraudster attends.

 

Most if not all schools have honor codes prohibiting this activity by students.  These jobs are also against the TOS.

 

IMO, this is despicable.  Period.  No excuse.

 

 

 

 

gilbert-phyllis
Community Member

These fraudulent job posts ebb and flow with the academic calendar. I've flagged a lot of them in the past week or so.

 

Each of us can choose to be part of the problem or part of the solution.

Upwork doesn't really seem to mind these job posts (though they say quite the contrary), so I don't bother flagging anymore. Not too long ago myself and another FL noted a profile (after she came to the forum for help) that seemed to be filled with nothing but academic fraud jobs. Of all the things that supposedly get caught by algorithms, you'd think jobs with blatant headings like "write my research paper for me" would get noticed. Considering Upwork's "eagle eyes" on all of us and our job performance, you'd think they'd notice when someone appears to be making money by doing other's homework ... you'd think, but you'd be wrong.

I have flagged "jobs" that include prominently displayed phrases including (but hardly limited to) the following:

 

"I am looking to get this research paper done for a class that I'm taking"

"Management and Policy take home final"

"Solve English assignment"

"Introduction to Finance Exam"

"Communications Skills Essay, First Year Uni" [University]

"I need a writer to compose a 1,000-word essay for a high school literature class"

 

Some of the jobs I have flagged were taken down. The majority of my flags received a perfunctory "Thanks," but the jobs remained live. And the freelancers who service these clients also remain "live" on Upwork.

kat303
Community Member


Janean L wrote:

I have flagged "jobs" that include prominently displayed phrases including (but hardly limited to) the following:

 

"I am looking to get this research paper done for a class that I'm taking"

"Management and Policy take home final"

"Solve English assignment"

"Introduction to Finance Exam"

"Communications Skills Essay, First Year Uni" [University]

"I need a writer to compose a 1,000-word essay for a high school literature class"

 

Some of the jobs I have flagged were taken down. The majority of my flags received a perfunctory "Thanks," but the jobs remained live. And the freelancers who service these clients also remain "live" on Upwork.


It's probably because the people responsible for taking these type of jobs down do not know or understand that words like exam, essay, class, assignment, take home final and research paper. refer to academic coursework and thus, they violate Upwork's TOS. 

Spoken like a true cynic, Virginia.

Remind me of one of my favorite Lily Tomlin quotes: "No matter how cynical we are, it's never enough."

bruce_dodds
Community Member

My first freelancing job (on Elance) was academic fraud.  The client  was someone from New Zealand who urgently needed an Access data import/export project done for a very large lamb wholesaler.  After getting over my discomfort with dealing in millions of lamb carcasses, I set to work.   I really wanted to do well on this first job.  I asked probing questions about the context of the system.  The client seemed strangely indifferent to how the system would actually work in daily production.  I pressed him unrelentingly to ask his boss to tie up loose ends.  Finally, he broke down and confessed that it was actually a school project.   He seemed very relieved a) to have things out in the open and b) get me off his back. 

 

So my naivete was killed early.  Since then I have always mentally vetted jobs for academic fraud.  If it's really obvious I report them.  If it seems likely but not certain I ignore them.  If it seems like a possibility I sometimes apply.  I haven't yet had to turn in any of the latter category.

 

 

 

 

re: "After getting over my discomfort with dealing in millions of lamb carcasses, I set to work"

 

But since this was just a school project, it means you didn't actually kill any lambs.

Anonymous-User
Not applicable

How about setting a trap? 
Create a category called "College Paper Writing" and then someone could just go in and remove the postings and the accounts en masse. 

 

These kids may get their degree, but they'll still be dumb and it will show on the job. 

I weep for the future.

When I lived in England, the son of the owner of this chippy I lived above heard that I do writing services and asked me for help with his thesis. I agreed to help because this poor dude's English was very lacking, and I thought he was worried about failing due to a language barrier. He then sent me 17 very poorly written pages (not just language-wise, the actual content was atrocious - I believe I did better research for a biology project when I was 10) and assumed that in a week, I would edit them into 40+ well-drafted pages - and when I said that definitely will not happen, misunderstanding the core of my objection, he went "But I've seen how fast you type!"

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