JEDDAH, 17 May 2005 — Writing a thesis or a research paper can be hard work, but some Saudi students are hiring others to create masterpieces of meaningless prose. Thousands of college and university students submit graduation theses and projects that are produced by other people and library workers for sums of money that vary from SR1,000 to SR4,000 per paper.

The students want the hirelings to produce the research, revised and printed before the due date.

Instructors consider the practice cheating and deception while the students call it “unofficial assistance” which creates a contradiction between the two academic groups Asharq Al-Awsat reported.

This practice not only is found in theoretical academic departments but also applied courses, such as engineering. An interior-design student in the Eastern Province went to one of the biggest architectural offices there to get a project completed that she should have done. She asked one of the engineers, Omar Makram, to do the work for her.

“She didn’t have a clear image of the project that she wanted, she just provided us with an idea that was in her head and some information gathered from the Internet and given to her by other advanced students,” Makram said.

“I handed her the project in by the due date she set to discuss it and correct it with her instructor. After the corrections were made by him, she didn’t even bother to call me to tell me the details.”

She paid him the money after the project was finished and got a high grade she didn’t deserve. “Hers is not an isolated case”, Makram said, adding that many students from different engineering departments come to him.

“I have met a lot of students from different disciplines,” he said. “Some of them participate with me in the project and some don’t know how to start, so I guide them, and they continue the rest while most of them let me do the whole thing alone.”

Architectural offices deny supporting those students, claiming that it might happen with individual workers but not through their offices.

Sometimes, students call for help or ask for assistance to accomplish a project, and individual engineers rush to extend a helping hand — but not for free.

Mohammed Al-Majed, an engineer, said his co-workers do students’ research demanding prices that vary from SR250 to SR650 depending on the course.

Proxy writing of projects is limited to a group of students that are able to pay project costs that generally range from SR3,000 to SR4,000. When the newspaper spoke to a group of interior design students however, they said they do all their own work.

Abu Rami is an Arab overstayer whose long experience completing assignments for students has made him capable of doing excellent work.

He says he has a large library containing thousands of books and other references that keep him going in this business. Some teachers also declare their contributions to those plagiarized projects.

Ali ibn Salih, a Jeddah teacher and graduate of KAAU, confesses he used to do many students’ assignments.

“My co-workers and I have done students’ research papers numerous times. This matter is bigger than anyone could imagine; it is spreading among university students and there is a lively market for this dirty business.” He said many students don’t even realize it’s cheating.

He thought that the problem resides in the instructors because students at that level of education demand that the instructor discuss every part of their assignments with them.

“The academic instructors used to ask us when we were students to submit our research under the doors of their offices if they were absent so they could take a look at it in their free time. So what do we expect from the students after all?

Dr. Ghazi Awad Allah, a member of the Information Department faculty at KAAU, said that he has decided to eliminate student research because he is sure that there are companies and libraries that do the research for students. He considers that both cheating and plagiary.

Although Dr. Mohammed Al-Abdullah, architecture dean at KFU in Damam, didn’t deny the spread of this practice, he said that is a global phenomenon that could be found in any university or educational institute.

“The faculty intends to initiate a direct discussion with the students to strengthen the relationship between students and instructors,” Al-Abdullah said. “We want to put the students under supervision by asking them to do an assignment at home — and then surprise them by asking them to apply their work at class and compare them.”

“We would notify the parents of the cheat and then transfer the case to the commission of inquiry to investigate the matter,” said Al-Abdullah. “We would take disciplinary and regulative procedures approved by the Ministry of Education. We sometimes forgive the students after hearing their excuses because our aim as academics is to reform the students not to punish them.”