National anti plagiarism strategies: a shared responsibility in transnational university partnerships?

Over the past ten years Australian universities have engaged in transnational partnerships with overseas institutions using a variety of different delivery methods. With these partnership arrangements, traditional problems with student plagiarism can occur; however, the international nature of arrangements can also give rise to additional problems. In 2002 the Centre for the Study of Higher Education (CSHE) at the University of Melbourne was commissioned by the AUTC to produce a booklet entitled 'Assessing Learning in Australian Universities' which included a section entitled 'Minimising Plagiarism'. In this paper the authors address the question of how the responsibility for implementing anti plagiarism strategies should be shared in transnational partnerships, and identify and discuss the associated difficulties. The authors review the experiences of dealing with student plagiarism in a course offered at Charles Sturt University, and consider the four-part strategy recommended in the CSHE booklet in the context of this subject delivery. The authors find that while the responsibility for some of the strategies lies solely with either the university or the transnational partner, other are clearly shared. Key difficulties discussed include resourcing strategy implementation at partner institutions and instilling and fostering shared commitment.