<p>I was just wondering what would happen if a college admission officer notices that two essays that he has read are very similar, even exactly the same. What would he do about those two applicants? Would he contact them both, just one of them, or not consider their applications at all? Would the college contact other colleges as well? I would really like an answer to this question. Thank you.</p>
<p>I think the most logical thing would be they would not accept either of the applicants. They may or may not contact the other colleges. Why did you plagiarize an essay written by someone else?</p>
<p>Or allow a friend to plagiarize you? And for the same college?!</p>
<p>You should have asked that question before you did it. :cool:</p>
<p>If I were the college seeing the two essays, I'd consider that one student might be the victim of theft. I'd call the guidance counselor and try to figure out what was going on. If I thought both the applicants would be rejected anyway, I might not bother-- but I might, just on general principles.</p>
<p>From their perspective, the easiest approach is to just reject them both so as not to have to deal with it. Colleges have lots of students to choose from and getting involved in potential plagarism issues is really messy. I know this from being a professor for 20 years (and on numerous admissions committees for graduate programs). When it's your own students, someone has to sort it out and it is a time consuming and very unpleasant task. When it's "just" college applicants, and you have loads of great applicants to choose from, any suspicion at all and it's just easier to hit the reject button. </p>
<p>The other thing I've noticed is that writers don't realize how easy it is for readers to remember what they've read. Nowadays we have TurnItIn and Google to easily find things that catch our eye that may be published elsewhere. But that aside, one notices when they see a turn of phrase, a familiar passage, an idea from before. When faced with the occasional plagarism issue, I think to myself, "what were they thinking?"..."do they think I don't actually read what they write?" or "why on earth would they think I wouldn't notice the same ____?"</p>
<p>I believe this HAS really happened. Admission was denied to both. No way to prove who really wrote the essay. Why is the OP asking this question? Hopefully it's to prevent someone from doing this. The reality is that no one really should HAVE a copy of your college essays...except you, the colleges and maybe your high school English teacher (if it was required that you do this for a course).</p>
<p>And another problem- getting into the school with the plagiarized essay and having them find out later- automatic dismissal at most schools, I would hope.</p>
<p>This discussion should also show students how careful they need to be about passing their essays around for feedback. Even a trusted teacher could accidentally leave an essay lying around where it could be picked up by the wrong person. </p>
<p>Worst case, a spiteful student could obtain a copy of your essay and apply to your first choice school just so you would be rejected. A little paranoia can be a good thing.</p>
<p>I'm also surprised that some students pass their essays around on CC.</p>
<p>Would withdrawing one's application be the best option to avoid any consequences (i.e. g.c. being contacted, other schools being notified)? How would one be able to to withdraw their application to the university?</p>
<p>You can call and send a letter to any college asking that your application be withdrawn. What you don't know...is if they have already read yours...and the other guy's essays already.</p>
<p>the same question has been posted on another forum here on CC
Different OP
assuming that the poster wants to know because he is the victim of plagarization or has plagarized:
Withdraw the applications, reapply with an entirely new application using your OWN WORK (OR DIFFERENT if it was your work that was stolen) and thank your lucky stars your poor judgement was not discovered.
If yours is the "original" and someone stole it from you, you should turn that person in.
If you think the essay will be discovered because you BOTH plagarized the same essay, dumb dumb dumb but see if you can withdraw your application and advise your "friend" to do the same.
In general, you won't get away with it/ and if you do you will live your life worrying about being discovered, so try to make things right, right now.</p>
<p>so you're saying that we can still withdraw applications after the deadline?</p>
<p>Yes. Do it ASAP. If you applied RD then most likely the essays have not yet been read.</p>
<p>Of course you can withdraw applications after deadline for applying. That's what students have to do after receiving an ED admission.</p>
<p>Why would you both withdraw? Just curious. I think it would look more suspicious to have two kids from the same school withdraw. My guess is that you and this friend are too entertwined and can only go to college together. Is this right?</p>
<p>If the college has an honor code, the proper thing to do is to turn yourself in.</p>
<p>"reapply with an entirely new application using your OWN WORK (OR DIFFERENT if it was your work that was stolen) and thank your lucky stars your poor judgement was not discovered"
No one can change their essay after the deadline for submission of applications has passed. If you are the victim of plagiarization then you need to contact the admissions office directly .</p>
<p>Why are the posts on this thread that make reference to software commonly used to detetc plagarism at universities now absent? Someone had asked about it and I had said of course universities likely use it. They use it for essay submissions for class so they'd likely use it for college admissions so of course they can easily know of an essay is plagarized. Why would they not use it?</p>
<p>So my point is that all universities I know use software to detect plagarism. How the software works is it has a giant database of a billion published works and things off the web. The database grows each time an essay or writing assignment by a student is run in the software. Very easy for universities to electronically run all essays into the software and if any prior writing overlaps with any written work in the database, it can be flagged as plagarized.</p>