Paperback Writer

Get your towels ready, it's about to go down.

So last week was pretty uneventful in class. Blond Sonja and Juarez Teenager Female shot me hard looks because I didn't re-join their coven learning team. My most recent old team looked at me longingly and whimpered when Stoner White Boy Cop and Angel Bautista announced that they had poached me. Yeah, I caved and joined the cop group...they're my people. And Angel Bautista is almost as smart as me. Typhoid Maria and Fat Alberto didn't show *tears* but they're names are still on the roster, so fingers crossed.

Shit got real earlier today, however. I was posting my individual work to the website and in the forum for Learning Team C there was a notification screaming at me. Okay, it was just sitting there in bold (1) but the OCD in me can't handle it. I am not in learning team C, nor did I know who was, but if I clicked, the (1) would go away. So I clicked. The post I see is from Juarez Teenager Female for her team's learning team charter. I can't explain it, but I had this gut feeling that I should download the document and read it. My gut is rarely wrong.

I open up the document and sure the fuck enough, I come face to face with my words. A while back in Big Time Army's class we had to come up with a team charter that was worth HELLA points. Hella. JTF and Blond Sonja didn't help (though they never did) and after four revisions, I submitted a 7-page masterpiece. Every possible situation that could occur was covered. Psychological strategies that could assist in conflict resolution to a detailed outline of team strategies for work completion was in there. Big Time Army said it was the greatest learning team charter he had ever seen. He also said on the returned document in bright red text that he knew that the other members of the group had not participated in writing ANY of the charter and they would NOT be receiving credit for it. Do I have that document? You bet your mother fucking ass I do. I keep everything school related. CYA. If you don't know what CYA means, you're doing it wrong.

Anyway, when JTF, Blond Sonja, and I parted ways due to different course requirements, I made it very clear: They were not to use my work. Not the charter, not any "team" assignments, not one damn word. They never contributed to the team projects. I did it all. I'm not complaining, it secured me the honors I will be graduating with, but I'm not going to let the further benefit from my intellectual property. Blond Sonja was like "Yeah, I won't." JTF was less agreeable. She was actually pretty pissed off. She said she had grown accustomed to A's and that if she needed to use some of the work, she would. Okay, she really said "Oh it's cause now we have to do so much work and my grades got gooder now. We can use some of it if it helps us right?" I told her that I submitted all of the "team" assignments into the plagiarism checker under my name only. Yep, I CYA'd way back then too. I informed her that any "team" stuff she tried to submit as her own would come back as a rip off of my work. She called me a bitch, or beesh, and drove off.

Should have been the end of that. Until there my words were. They didn't even change the parts that say my name in it. Genius. I mulled it over for maybe 30 seconds and then sprung into action. I emailed the instructor. Now wait a second before you call me a rat, let me explain.

Our instructor let us know in week one that because this course is our final criminal justice course and a review of all the other ones we have taken, we could use our own past works to create our new assignments. As I have kept detailed record from every class, I literally have the entire course complete. All I have to do is show up. And contribute a minuscule amount to the team. That's it. So when I read my words posted under someone else's name (with my name still there) even after I warned her not to, I began to worry about what else she might use. I am THIS CLOSE to being done. I don't need to get popped in some academic dishonesty bullshit. I'm not really sure that I would, she'd be the one cheating, not me, but I don't want to get mixed up in that shit.

My email was very professional. I thanked him for his outstanding feedback for my week one paper (it was really great) and told him how much I looked forward to the next four weeks. Then I eased into the issue. I said that something regarding Team C concerned me. The charter they submitted was my intellectual property and they were trying to pass it off as their own. I told him what page he could find my name and information on. I said if need be I could provide proof that the work was mine, and also, that one check through the plagiarism checker would back me up. I said I didn't want to get anyone in trouble, but I feared that more of my intellectual property would be compromised. I stated I did not want anyone to get in trouble, but I would be requesting they remove the aforementioned intellectual property or I would be submitting them to the university for academic integrity violations. I also added that this week we were reviewing ethics and professional behavior in criminal justice, qualities that these two aspiring criminal justice professionals were NOT exhibiting.

Yeah, I'm that guy. Or girl. Or asshole. But yep, that's me. I didn't tell him so that he could do something; I told him because I WAS doing something. CYA.

I didn't even bother with Blond Sonja. She's dyed her hair black BTW. She's not even remotely concerned with academic integrity. She boasted that she buys her papers online. So I went straight to JTF. I emailed her this:

JTF,
It has come to my attention that you are using my intellectual property as your own. While any instructor can clearly see that the writing is above your level and would never believe that you constructed your learning team charter, I am very disturbed you would attempt to pass this off as your own. I believe your were already instructed that any work submitted by me on behalf of our team was off-limits to you once we parted ways. If I remember correctly this upset you greatly as you had planned to commit academic fraud with it. I see you went ahead with that plan. 

I cannot compel you to do the right thing. If you're determined to "earn" your degree through fraud and the hard work of others, by all means, please continue. However, I implore you to remove my charter from your learning team forum before class tonight. Additionally, any further use of the charter or any other copies of MY intellectual property will force my hand and I WILL report you to the university. 

Please do the right thing if it is in you. Thank you.


Yeah, I am a bitch. But JTF texted me almost immediately. She fell all over herself apologizing and BEGGED me to not report her. She said she would take it down right away and delete all the "other things of yours I has." Scared straight. Or not, but at least she knows I know. And our instructor knows. Ain't nobody gonna break my stride...

She looked scared when she went into class tonight. I enjoyed it.

Tune in next week. I just might blog again.