Many
students have been purchasing custom essays online and this has recently caused
a great deal of controversy in the education system. The aim of this article is
to describe the transition of the traditional “essay banks" to what are known
as “custom essay sites" and the further progression to “personalised essay
sites", and to outline the common grounds under which the use of these services
are deemed to be perfectly legitimate and reasonable.
The
traditional essay banks that still exist today are purveyors of pre-written
essays that allow students to ramble through them and find an essay that they
can use to benefit their studies. There are many problems associated with the
use of essay banks, for instance not only do they seldom provide the relevant
material to the student, but they are not unique and therefore they fail to
culminate the required research for the customer. This means that one would
have to spend hours searching the essay banks (often having to purchase the
right to view numerous essays) in order to achieve a reasonable amount of
research to refer to. Not only is this extremely time consuming, but it could
often prove very expensive, with students spending a great deal of time and money
only to end up with more than few vague, poor quality essays to help them with
their studies.
The many
problems associated with essay banks led to birth of the custom essay sites.
These sites set out to solve the problems common to essay banks by providing
essays that are written to the customers’ question. This enabled students to
purchase a model answer specific to their requirements without having to search
the internet for hours. This eventually had its adverse effects on the market,
with many custom essay sites using this as an opportunity to use their custom
essay service to build up their own essay banks, as well as using their
existing essay banks to create custom research from. Customers were essentially
buying an often wholly plagiarised piece taken from, or soon to appear on an
essay bank. They were essentially paying for a piece of research that would
soon benefit other students, therefore taking away any competitive advantages
that the model answer would have granted them.
The next
phase was the innovative creation of the “personalised essay service". These
services provide a piece of research that is custom written to the exact
requirements of the customer, with a guaranteed level such as a guaranteed First
Class or 2:1 standard. These essays are scanned for plagiarism, ensuring each
piece of work is unique, furthermore they will not appear on an essay bank or
database for a fair period of time – 4 years or more, and will never be resold.
Now for
the speculation – are these personalised essay sites aimed to encourage
cheating. Having looked at the main websites in this industry, I have examined
the grounds under which their service is intended and should be used. Under the
FAQ section of one of the main providers, it was fairly argued “Our aim is to produce essays and research materials in order to aid
and inspire your topic or subject area. We deliver model answers to the
questions that our customers submit to us- that means the research materials
that you receive would guarantee a 2:1 or 1st class in a like for like exam.
The work that our researchers produce for you is for your own reference, to
benefit your final piece, however it is not intended for you to pass off as
your own. We rely on our customers to use our service sensibly." (www.essaysforstudents.com) Furthermore,
they retain the copyright for all their research pieces and if used sensibly,
their service is merely offering substantial support to customers, just as a
private tutor would. They do not condone cheating in any form and act to
discourage it.
By Tanya Scott
