An essay mill, sometimes also called a paper mill, is the colloquial term for a type of ghostwriting service which specializes in the sale of essays, term papers, and other forms of homework assignments to university and college students. Some universities and colleges consider the practice to be academic dishonesty or academic fraud and may investigate homework turned in by a student, if the paper's content comes under suspicion. Measures include using Internet plagiarism detection software, which compares essays against a database of known essay mill essays; and orally testing students on the contents of their papers, in cases where a paper is a suspected 'essay mill' product. This article is about a ghostwriter, the type of writer. ... For other uses, see Essay (disambiguation). ... For the Daft Punk album, see Homework (album). ... Academic dishonesty or academic misconduct is any type of cheating that occurs in relation to a formal academic exercise. ... An academic scandal is one that exposes the unethical or erroneous work of a major academic figure. ... For other uses, see Plagiarism (disambiguation). ...

Types of essay mill products

'Essay mill' companies hire university students, graduates, and professional writers to ghostwrite essays and term papers, and solicit business from university and college students by posting advertisements. Until the early 1990s, most essay mill companies were 'bricks and mortar' businesses offering their services by mail-order or from offices located in university or college towns. By the 2000s, most essay mill businesses have switched to an e-commerce business model, soliciting business and selling essays using an Internet website. Companies often provide free sample essays on popular topics, such as Hamlet or The Merchant of Venice to attract Internet searches.^{[citation needed]} Electronic commerce, EC, e-commerce or ecommerce consists primarily of the distributing, buying, selling, marketing, and servicing of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. ... Online means being connected to the Internet or another similar electronic network, like a bulletin board system. ... For other uses, see Hamlet (disambiguation). ... Title page of the first quarto (1600) The Merchant of Venice is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written sometime between 1596 and 1598. ...

The most basic 'essay mill' service is the sale of a previously-written essay; services advertise essays that have allegedly gained a good grade and which have allegedly not been used for plagiarism before. Unless the company is registered and located in a region where the law covers such sales (such as in the United Kingdom^{[citation needed]}) students using essay mill services have little or no legal recourse if the essay they purchase has not actually received a good grade. To protect against such instances, it may be useful to order from Ebay. For other uses, see Plagiarism (disambiguation). ...

Since submitting a previously-written essay exposes a student to the risk of detection, some students will pay a much higher price for custom-written papers that take into account the course outline, topic, number of sources and any specific grade the student wants. While some students select a high grade on the ghostwritten paper to boost their average, other students with poor grades may choose to purchase a paper that deliberately contains errors, and which will receive a grade such as "C+", to reduce the suspicion that they have committed academic dishonesty. Academic dishonesty or academic misconduct is any type of cheating that occurs in relation to a formal academic exercise. ...

Criticism and controversy

The academic community has criticized essay mill companies for helping students to commit academic fraud.

Some essay mills have defended themselves against these criticisms by claiming that they are selling pre-written examples which students can use as guidelines and models for the student's own work. In 2002, a UK-based essay mill called Elizabeth Hall Associates required students purchasing essays to sign a disclaimer stating that "any material provided by Elizabeth Hall Associates [is] on the understanding that it is a guidance model only."^[1] Other essay mills claim that they are "scholarly publishing houses" that provide students with essays that the student can then cite in the student's own work.

Strategies for combating academic fraud

Universities and colleges have developed several strategies to combat this type of academic misconduct. Some professors require students to submit electronic versions of their term papers, so that the text of the essay can be compared by anti-plagiarism software against databases of known 'essay mill' term papers. Academic dishonesty is cheating or plagiarism that occurs within an educational setting. ...

Other universities have enacted rules allowing professors to give students viva voce (oral) examinations on papers which a professor believes to be 'ghostwritten'; if the student is unfamiliar with the content of an essay that they have submitted, or its sources, then the student can be charged with academic fraud, a violation of the rules by which a student agrees to be bound when they enter a university or college program. Look up viva voce in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

When a student is charged with academic fraud, their case is typically heard by a quasi-judicial administrative committee, which reviews the evidence. For students who are found guilty, the punishments range from failure in the course in which the plagiarism occurred to suspension or expulsion. In some cases, students who have committed academic fraud may also have any academic honours, degrees, or awards revoked.

Subcontracting

The contract cheating research literature, which encompasses multiple outsourcing opportunities for students, of which essay banks are one, reports that students are putting assessed work to tender to essay sites. The research reports that some essay sites are not completing work for students in-house. Instead, they are using auction sites to subcontract work out at a lower cost than would be required by directly paying ghostwriters.^[2] // Definition Contract cheating is a phenomena which was observed in 2006 by Thomas Lancaster and Robert Clarke at the University of Central England, Birmingham in which students get others to complete their coursework for them by putting it out to tender. ... Outsourcing is subcontracting a process, such as product design or manufacturing, to a third-party company. ... For other uses, see Ghostwriter (disambiguation). ...

See also

• Diploma mill
• Plagiarism
• Ghostwriting
• Academic dishonesty
• Contract cheating

A diploma mill (also known as a degree mill) is an organization that awards academic degrees and diplomas with substandard or no academic study, and without recognition by official accrediting bodies. ... For other uses, see Plagiarism (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Ghostwriter (disambiguation). ... Academic dishonesty or academic misconduct is any type of cheating that occurs in relation to a formal academic exercise. ... // Definition Contract cheating is a phenomena which was observed in 2006 by Thomas Lancaster and Robert Clarke at the University of Central England, Birmingham in which students get others to complete their coursework for them by putting it out to tender. ...

Further reading

• The Cheating Culture: Why More Americans Are Doing Wrong To Get Ahead (New York: Harcourt 2004)
• Ann Lathrop & Kathleen Foss. Student Cheating & Plagiarism to the Internet Era: A Wake-Up Call for Educators & Parents (New York: Libraries Unlimited 2000)
• James Page. 2004. 'Cyber-pseudepigraphy: A New Challenge for Higher Education Policy and Management'. Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management. 26(3):429-433; available on-online at http://eprints.qut.edu.au/archive/00006015/.

References