I didn't know that particular site, and wow it looks professional. It's also more affordable than I would've believed; today's high school students seem to have a whole lot more money in their pockets than we did at that age. I do notice that it doesn't even address the major issues that should cross every student's mind: Is this ethical? Am I likely to get caught?
As a teacher, I'll point out a couple things though:
- It doesn't take me long to "get to know" my students' writing, and when something extra-good or extra-bad pops up, I notice. And I question. Some of my writing is done in class. If a student's in-class essays are garbage, while their take-home work is wonderful, I notice. I may not know whether the stuff is being written by a girlfriend or parent (more common than you'd believe) or whether it's purchased, but I'll smell a rat a mile away.
- The plagiarism software that we have today is very good; however, if this site is providing individual essays for each purchaser, then it won't catch the purchased essay -- the software works by storing past essays, so the essay is caught THE SECOND TIME it's submitted. The first person who turns it in won't be caught. Most kids who cheat simply copy something off the internet, and that's what the plagiarism software catches. Moreover, I can catch that myself very easily: When writing seems, um, out of a student's league . . . I go to a paragraph in the middle of the paper (because students are careful in the beginning, but they get lazy) and pick a couple sentences with, um, unlikey language choices . . . and I pop them into google. Voila! Evidence! I'm right more often than I'm wrong.
Going back to the purchased essay concept, of course, the obvious question is, As a purchaser, how do you KNOW the writer didn't already give this essay to someone else? A person who would write for such a site has already proven he has no regard for academic ethics, so why do you think he'd "play fair" with you? You have no way to know whether you're actually the first purchaser or the fiftieth. And if you're not first, the plagiarism software will catch you.
- The big thing kids HATE to write is the research paper, and it's pretty much impossible to use a site like this for a research paper. Why? Because, as an English teacher, I'm going to require X number of note cards by this date, the outline by next week, the introduction by that date, etc. That's hard to fake.
- If her teacher ever catches her using someone else's writing, that teacher will never forget it and will probably say to the next year's teacher, "Keep an eye on so-and-so. I did catch her cheating once." I personally would not write a college recommendation for a student whom I'd caught cheating, and I would explain WHY I didn't feel comfortable with it. This could easily go beyond one little essay grade.
Regardless, your niece probably mentioned it because she's curious about whether you'll approve or disapprove. You have to come down hard on the side of NO, We don't do that in our family. You know that she needs the practice in composing her thoughts on paper.
Finally, though this is very off-topic, I'll throw it in: If your niece needs help with her writing, I suggest you work on organizing her thoughts. That's the #1 reason kids don't write well -- they don't want to stop and plan, they don't want to outline, they just want to throw something on paper, and stream-of-consciousness isn't a good method for writing. Kids who are able to categorize and organize their ideas can almost always write a good paper. The best starting place: Jot down notes. They don't have to be written into a formal outline, but writing them down forces the student to think through what is to be written.
Mama was NOT HAPPY.
