VOA标准英语2015--西方学生将作业外包给肯尼亚作家

Western Students Outsource Work to Kenyan Writers 西方学生将作业外包给肯尼亚作家 

NAIROBI—

On the University of Nairobi campus, talent is on sale.

Signs advertise for researchers or online writers — code words for those writing essays for paying students at universities around the world.

One such writer is Aggrey Isoe, who has been in the business since 2010. As a freelancer¹, he can work wherever he wants. He gets his assignments through websites that post requests from students around the world.

Isoe said he's written assignments for undergrads, master's students — even the occasional Ph.D.

“The topics are broad — social sciences; the sciences, especially biology; law, business, marketing², psychology³, sociology,” he said.

The work calls for a degree of creativity. Isoe once had to write a first-person experience for a student trying to get into a nursing program in California.

“Actually, you have to put yourself into his or her shoes and be creative," he said. "In fact, the client was from India [and] she had to give reasons why she had to leave all the schools in India to come to that particular institution.”

Writers can find assignments on certain. On one site registered in Kenya, a writer was being sought to turn out an undergraduate level essay in chemistry, eight pages long and due in 30 days. For that, the writer could earn a little over $90.

While the Kenyan students are doing nothing illegal in writing for pay, their clients are violating one of the first rules of academic integrity. Students caught using such a service would probably face serious consequences at most universities.

Pauline Chepkwony, a University of Nairobi graduate with an undergraduate degree in sociology and a master's degree in international affairs, is a former academic writer. She struggled with the ethics⁴ of doing this type of work.

“If you look at it from a moral or ethical⁵ perspective, it’s kind of ... it’s not right,” she said.

But she said the pay was good, and in the end the work helped her to be better at her own studies.

Writers in Kenya say the business is booming — a sign that clients abroad are increasingly outsourcing their work to talented students who are truly finding African solutions to Western problems.

1 freelancer   

n.自由职业者

参考例句：

• He has great interest in working as a freelancer.他对做个自由职业人很感兴趣。
• It's not always easy to make it as a freelancer.做个自由职业人，要能时常感觉满足，可不容易。

2 marketing   

n.行销，在市场的买卖，买东西

参考例句：

• They are developing marketing network.他们正在发展销售网络。
• He often goes marketing.他经常去市场做生意。

3 psychology   

n.心理，心理学，心理状态

参考例句：

• She has a background in child psychology.她受过儿童心理学的教育。
• He studied philosophy and psychology at Cambridge.他在剑桥大学学习哲学和心理学。

4 ethics   

n.伦理学；伦理观，道德标准

参考例句：

• The ethics of his profession don't permit him to do that.他的职业道德不允许他那样做。
• Personal ethics and professional ethics sometimes conflict.个人道德和职业道德有时会相互抵触。

5 ethical   

adj.伦理的，道德的，合乎道德的

参考例句：

• It is necessary to get the youth to have a high ethical concept.必须使青年具有高度的道德观念。
• It was a debate which aroused fervent ethical arguments.那是一场引发强烈的伦理道德争论的辩论。