ghost writing services

ghost writing services

Exploring the Ethical and Academic Implications of Ghostwriting Services in Higher Education

1. Introduction to Ghostwriting Services

The use of essay mills encourages academic dishonesty and provides students with the means to cheat. Covert research has shown that hundreds of organizations offering writing services ranging from editing and proofreading to full writing completion are active, and approaches are generally permitted on university campuses or via social media. What are the ethical considerations inherent in these kinds of services when utilized by students at the undergraduate level? To what extent do students understand the nature of these ethical considerations? Are there enough resources and support to instill in students a sense of personal academic integrity and, if so, to what extent do students adopt the idea of personal integrity as their behavior aligns with their understanding? These services have also been related to a decline in cognitive skills development, academic dishonesty, and professional cheating in post-tertiary careers.

Ghostwriting services in higher education Students who are unable to commit time to research and write university assignments often turn to ghostwriting services for assistance. Ethical issues associated with providing writing assistance are a key focus of this research, which sought to affirm our understanding of what students consider ethical, while also identifying potential gaps in knowledge that may indicate the need for additional instruction. The project also aimed to understand how students interpret the term plagiarism, how they define the extent of allowable writing assistance, and the extent to which they have received academic integrity instruction. Our initial concerns were that students have a tendency to rationalize poor study habits and, partially due to time constraints, adopt a flexible view of ethical behavior when it comes to assignment preparation, and that these individuals are likely to provide similar rationalizations when purchasing assignments, or plagiarism, which is at the core of this project. Through open text responses, this study identified the extent of writing assistance services, including ghostwriting, which were offered by professional organizations, and asked if regulations were in place to control these organizations.

2. Ethical Considerations in Academic Writing

While students engage in writing for ethical reasons, workload pressures are so great that most students would like to use external writing services. Other students feel justified in paying for writing services, given that the services themselves promote a kind of ethical amnesia. Universities investing resources solely in detecting plagiarism may think of themselves as ethical enforcers of academic standards. But anti-ghost policy for external writing services substitutes wishful banishment for the pragmatic inclusion of student writing choices in the university’s ethical climate. Colleges and universities must also take responsibility for the acquired skills of the student, a benefit of their value.

Few people do not identify ethics as an issue in using academic ghostwriting services. Let’s begin with an understanding of the ethical obligations that universities have toward their students. According to Ferrero (2002), these obligations essentially fall into three categories: (a) to teach students about the ethical standards of the discipline, (b) to expect students to abide by those standards, and (c) to support those students committed to upholding those standards. Ferrero (2002) adds that while universities have a stake in this ethical set of relationships, the focus should not be on what universities can do for society, but rather should concentrate on what they do for society. This reciprocity should also be part of the ethical environment in which students hone writing skills to meet acceptable academic standards.

3. Impact on Academic Integrity and Education Quality

However, the most essential information provided by this chapter is the evidence that users of such services are predominantly students whose mother tongue is English and whose education takes place in native English-speaking countries. These findings mostly disqualify the legitimacy of the notion that the increase in demand for ghostwriting services is driven by an increase in the number of international students enrolling in university education in English-speaking countries. The growing internationalization of higher education is likely to have audiences who will exploit ghostwriting as an easy way to organize their learning and their lives as students. It is a speculative assumption, however, that ghostwriting only helps graduate individuals who make bigoted claims about the quality of education and academic abilities of such students, advise them to drop their studies, and send them home. The dubious ethical and social consequences of such practices, then, do not affect the role of the ghostwriting industry in today’s higher education reality.

While educators, especially those in higher education, are unlikely to change the minds of those who already engage in contract cheating, it is essential to understand why students turn to such alternative ways of obtaining academic work. One popular explanation is the claim that the increase in the number of students from non-English backgrounds among learners at Western universities creates a strain on academic literacy resources. To address this claim, this article has examined the profiles of multiple ghostwriting services. The preliminary findings reveal that currently available ghostwriting services are capable of providing various types of assessments and are ready to offer services across multiple academic disciplines. Of these types, the most popular are essays, research papers, and coursework.

4. Strategies for Addressing Ghostwriting in Higher Education

Introduction The marketing, business, and student services literature and research findings are virtually unanimous on this point. Institutions of higher education are offering students quality products and experiences with measurable, substantial, and enduring value. Yet, while institutions claim that they place the greatest value in their understanding of student writing – and on the academic experiences of all of these, there is an implicit contradiction in their curriculum and, in most, if not all, their writers.

Expanding the complexities of the writing assignment Writing is a complex intellectual task involving many subtasks, each of which places unique demands on the writer. Writing an academic research paper is also viewed as a particularly complex form of writing and is based on a set of abstract conventions that students struggle to master. Increasing assignments followed by feedback, in addition to the flexibility to continue to discover and receive feedback on every aspect of their writing. Ultimately, good writing, like good teaching, requires a combination of inspiration, feedback, support, and attention to detail. With this in mind, we recommend giving students an opportunity to briefly reflect on the framing of an e-commerce/ghostwriting assignment that they feel confident with upon receipt of their grade.

Several strategies can be implemented to further minimize the risk of students purchasing ghostwritten work. We propose the following strategy: