It’s that time of year again. The end of the semester. Finals and paper deadlines are sneaking up on you. So is the panicky realization that failing to study or go to class may not translate into the grade you are looking for.  And now, instead of sucking up bad behavior and cramming all that knowledge into your head in a few all night study sessions, you turn to the internet in hopes that there’s an expert on the Spanish American War, or Chekov’s short stories, or writing a business plan who just happens to be waiting to share that expertise with you in exchange for your (or, likely, your parents’) hard-earned shekels.  Knowledge, mind you, which she did manage to go to class and learn.

Why We Won’t Do It

First, shame on you. You are cheating. Your college degree? If you do manage to make it to the big stage, you might as well snatch it out of its attractive frame and tear it up, because you did not earn it. What is a college degree without a record that you actually sat in a class and learned something? When a future employer sees the GPA on your resume, she has a reasonable right to expect that you know the material you purported to study. Put yourself in the place of the losing candidate who did not cheat but ended up with less than your spectacular GPA or degree?  How would you like to be that poor guy that got beaten out by a cheat? May there be a thumbtack in your chair when you sit down on your first day on the job.

I know it might not seem like it now, but learning really is its own reward. I admit I was tempted to skip American Philosophy more than once, but I stuck it out. I also got a B, and that hurt my GPA. But when I look back on my college career I can be proud of learning the material in each and every class without relying on anyone else to do my work for me.

None of this getting through? Then how about listening to a little plain old common sense?

Why it Doesn’t Even Make Sense to Ask

• Like Snowflakes, No Two Writers are Alike – Remember those essay questions you muddled your way through on the midterm? Your professor read those. And unless Jupiter aligns with Neptune, chances are my writing style is going to sound nothing like yours.  Your professor likely has a Ph.D. for pete’s sake. She’s going to notice.
• Neither Are Any Two Classes – Have you ever taken a two part class with different professors? Did you notice that each professor had his own style, preferences and opinions? They are going to want to see these preferences and opinions reflected in your paper.  Academics may seem like dotty old pipe-smokers, but that’s a façade. They disagree. On everything.  Have you ever read a peer review of an academic article? They make the worst YouTube internet flame look like a birthday party invitation. (This is why I can tell you with a certainty to never sit two anthropologists together at your Christmas dinner. Trust me on this one.)

In short, your professor is going to want a paper in a certain style, with certain preferences, predicated on certain theories. The freelancer you hire the night before the paper was due did not take your class. Something’s going to look fishy.

I hope this has explained why a freelance writer with a social conscience will not write your 5-10 page paper on the depiction of migrant works in Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath.  Now stop asking.