IP Q and A

Twigga wrote: It sounds like time and hands are short Kit. Can you tell me more about the IP team, what the responsibilities are, and how we can participate and help?

Thank you for digging those up for me Brick there's been a few changes so I'll go ahead and rehash it <3

The IP Team is intended to act as Novice's point of contact for questions. It was created to bring some support to the IP which was a very lonely process and we noticed a lot of Novices just disappearing. The intent is to have each Novice assigned to a Sponsor who reads their journal entries as they're posted. Sponsors provide support with prompting questions to expand your journals, keeps an eye on lesson requirements to ensure Novice's journals are meeting the minimum standards, and just be an all-around cheer-leader for when you need it. At least that's the idea, but with the limited hands and the overwhelming number of Novices I didn't realize we had, that's still a future goal.

I turned the Team over to MadHatter , he's been a most excellent lead over the last six+ months and may have changed a few things, so if you want clarification, details, or wish to volunteer, go toss a PM at him. But Initiates and up are encouraged to join the team. As Ari said, you need to have already gone through the process to be able to help others (at least officially)

I took a look at the Wikipedia link on Plagiarism; and it was a bit confusing. It says that plagiarism is defined very differently in journalism, academia, and in law. It even implies that plagiarism in the arts is seen, at times, quite positively.

Would I be right to understand that the definition of plagiarism within TotJO is along the lines that you’ve described here? Less than 20% coming from other sources (even if they are cited in the bibliography) and no phrases taken out of other individuals' IP posts without acknowledgement?

What constitutes an appropriate citation? Can I write "Sponsors provide support with prompting questions to expand your journals, keeps an eye on lesson requirements to ensure Novice's journals are meeting the minimum standards, and just be an all-around cheer-leader for when you need it." (Thanks Kit)? Or is that still unclear?

Twigga wrote: I took a look at the Wikipedia link on Plagiarism; and it was a bit confusing. It says that plagiarism is defined very differently in journalism, academia, and in law. It even implies that plagiarism in the arts is seen, at times, quite positively.

Would I be right to understand that the definition of plagiarism within TotJO is along the lines that you’ve described here? Less than 20% coming from other sources (even if they are cited in the bibliography) and no phrases taken out of other individuals' IP posts without acknowledgement?

What constitutes an appropriate citation? Can I write "Sponsors provide support with prompting questions to expand your journals, keeps an eye on lesson requirements to ensure Novice's journals are meeting the minimum standards, and just be an all-around cheer-leader for when you need it." (Thanks Kit)? Or is that still unclear?

I'm actually working on a lesson/article that will clear up all of that but the details are still foggy because I haven't written anything down so it may change from what I say here.

In our world, plagiarism is copying or paraphrasing another's words without proper citation. Honestly, paraphrasing will be hard for us to 'catch', but citing that is a necessary part of integrity and morals too.

I'm planning a very simple citation process, Novices are welcome to use a more advanced one but most of what we're concerned about is that there are quotes and links. Your example would not be enough (who is Kit? Where did they say this? is this a part of a larger whole?). So in a journal you would write something like:

Words words words, "Sponsors provide support with prompting questions to expand your journals, keeps an eye on lesson requirements to ensure Novice's journals are meeting the minimum standards, and just be an all-around cheer-leader for when you need it." (1) words words words...A Team is a group of people working together(2).



(1) Kit: www.templeofthejediorder.org/forum/ip-st...nd-a?start=20#319311
(2) Dictionary.com www.dictionary.com/browse/team?s=t

Where (1) is referencing a direct quote (known by using the quotation marks), and (2) is a paraphrase (referencing where I learned the information from, but written in my own words). It's important to include all your references when you do research for a few reasons. The main one is to credit those who you got the information from, but it also lets you check back on your references if you need to share them with someone else, AND it allows the Knights to be sure you're using proper, legitimate, and reliable sources. Now if you already know what a team is, you don't need to reference it, this was just an example

Should, perhaps, a fourth part to Lesson 0 be added to get Novice's to post the dictionary definition, as well as their understanding of plagiarism and how to avoid it?

All of this could be new to people who are some way through their IP Kit... How do we go about fixing things? Do we just wait to the end of the IP?

Twigga wrote: All of this could be new to people who are some way through their IP Kit... How do we go about fixing things? Do we just wait to the end of the IP?

Arisaig wrote: Should, perhaps, a fourth part to Lesson 0 be added to get Novice's to post the dictionary definition, as well as their understanding of plagiarism and how to avoid it?

It'll go somewhere like that Ari. Once I get it written (should be this week) I'll put it up to the Edu department and we'll decide where to stick it. It'll either be an early lesson with a reminder before the 'esssay' portions (I'm pretty sure that's where the self research comes in first) or put up as a reference and linked in the IP. I feel like a lesson would be best IMO. That way we can point back to their journal entry and say "Hey, remember what you saw here? yeah let's do that"

That's also probably a good place to put the consequences too.

The consequences? What might they be?

Twigga wrote: The consequences? What might they be?

Honestly, we're re-working them. I've come to discover that when I wrote them, I was a little too harsh and too black-and-white with it. They were originally written when I was finding journals where Novices would look up old journals and copy-paste them and it royally ticked me off (honestly I had them even harsher but Alex softened it in a few places). Although it was funny once when a Knight went to review a journal and found some rather familiar words (the Novice had copied the Knight's own journal)

Now I'm going to say this will probably change (it will if I have any say but it needs voting) but here's the process right now.

The IP Team searches for plagiarism in each journal, I don’t think that the Knights also need to, but they can if they feel they need to.

-Once a Novice is discovered to have plagiarized, the IP Team notifies the IP Team Lead, and assigns the Novice to the Lead.

-The Lead will post details in the Admin Forums about the plagiarism, a link to their journal, and the one they copied (or website). This is for Temple records in case the Novice does it again.

-The Lead will soft delete the Novice’s Journal editing the first post with a note in the first line "Locked for plagiarism -(name)". This is so they cannot go back and plagiarize their own plagiarism.

-No other record or announcement is needed. This will be to ensure the Novice has a legitimate second-chance and Knights are not biased when looking for potential apprentices.

-The Lead will hold a conversation with the Novice, asking them why they had plagiarized, explain why it is not tolerated, and what they now need to do. This should be a conversation and not a dressing-down.

-The Novice will then be required to start the IP from the beginning, no matter how far in they’d gotten or how much they had plagiarized by opening a new journal and starting at Lesson 0

- If the Novice plagiarizes a second time, they are banned from training at TotJO (not banned from the forums)

I had written this with the idea that anyone plagiarizing was doing it as an intentional means to skip out on the work. Not that someone might not understand what plagiarism was or how to properly cite their work. I'm not sure how the rules will be changed, or if putting the plagiarism/citation lesson in the IP will mitigate needing to change them. I am open to hearing ideas though (in PM or another thread so we don't draw this one off course)

One of the other things you mentioned was the 60 day limit. If I'd finished in fewer than 60 days, should I wait before submitting my journal, since the checking process does seem to take a while, Or should I wait, because I won't be granted the rank of Initiate before the 60 days are up anyway; and I might think of something relevant to add in the mean time?