“Can you proofread my thesis by tomorrow?” – Editorial Freelancing in the Student Market - Louise Harnby

“Can you proofread my thesis by tomorrow?” – Editorial Freelancing in the Student Market

11/5/2012

A note from Louise: This guest article from my colleague Dr Shani D’Cruze is a thoughtful assessment of the dissertation/thesis market for editorial freelancers. It reviews the reasons for the growth of the sector, the possibilities and potential problems for the proofreader and copy-editor (including ethical issues), and the guidance offered by education institutions and professional societies.

As someone who not so long ago supervised and examined student dissertations and theses, and now offers to proofread and copy-edit them, I was interested when I found the online discussion board for the Society of Editors and Proofreaders preoccupied by the professional and ethical issues that student clients raise for SfEP members.

Although especially perfectionist students and those with dyslexia or similar conditions do seek professional editing and proofreading advice, the main constituency for proofreaders’ or copy-editors’ services are students for whom English is not their first language. (The issues are also somewhat different for students with dyslexia, for whom external proofreading can come under the rubric of “special needs” and, on a case-by-case basis, these days may be negotiated through their university.)

The growth of the international student community
The number of international students in UK universities has been rising for some time. The global dominance of English (and American English) as the language for political, administrative and academic communication – and the status of a degree from an English (or American) university – ensures that despite recent increased difficulties in obtaining visas for some students, the growing opportunities to earn a UK university qualification by studying outside the country, and concerns in some quarters that increasing student numbers will put undue pressure on resources and the student experience overall will deteriorate, international student numbers in the UK will go on rising, helped, not least, by a recent initiative from the prime minister (John Morgan, Times Higher Education, 19 January 2012; Eliza Anyangwe, Guardian, 16 April 2012; Claire Rodwell and Kyle Thetford, Cherwell, 3 May 2012).

In 2010–11, 428,225 students in UK universities (17 per cent) came from outside the EU. International students comprised 70 per cent of full-time taught postgraduates and 48 per cent of full-time research postgraduates (IKCISA). In 2012 there are 67,000 students from China and 39,000 from India studying in the UK, and numbers from these countries are set to increase (Sean Coghlan, BBC News, 13 March 2012).

The reasons for the universities’ readiness to recruit more overseas students are not hard to find. It has comparatively little to do with altruistic impulses towards the globalization of knowledge: these days UK universities can’t afford to be altruistic.

It’s about hard cash. UK higher education has been struggling for some years against declining levels of government funding, and increasingly the funding they receive is allocated according to assessments of “excellence” in research and teaching. Today, while fee levels for UK and EU students are capped, universities can charge other students as much as the market will stand (Graeme Paton and Heidi Blake, Telegraph, 12 February 2010).

The challenges facing international students
Earning an undergraduate or postgraduate degree in your second (or third) language has its challenges, and so does providing a supportive learning environment for non-native English speakers.

Universities want to be able to award good, academically sound degrees to the international students that they recruit: academic staff and departments are for the most part committed to providing a good learning experience for their students and the university as a whole is driven by the imperatives of maintaining “quality” and “excellence”.

Nevertheless, as professional proofreaders and editors can testify, it’s no easy matter to write in fluent academic English when it’s your second language, even for someone who can handle everyday communication with ease.

As an academic editor (and as a copy-editor) I’ve worked on many occasions with accomplished scholars, both postgraduate and faculty, whose research skills and conceptualization were far better than mine, but whose written academic English needed extensive editing to make it effective (sometimes to make it intelligible).

The challenges facing proofreaders and copy-editors
Judging from discussions on the SfEP discussion board, professional proofreaders and copy-editors have mixed views about working on students’ theses and dissertations. Some stick to the position that if it's meant to be the student's unaided work, and that is very strictly interpreted, there isn't any role for a professional proofreader.

This has been argued to be particularly the case in arts subjects where the quality of expression is so closely integrated into the creation of meaning and argument. A bad experience with a non-paying or overly demanding student customer can also deter professionals.

The PhD student expecting to find a proofreader for their 80,000-word thesis a week before their final deadline is not that uncommon. Others from the SfEP find that student clients tend to question every change or correction because of their lack of familiarity with academic conventions.

Above all, students are perhaps the category of clients who are least willing to pay the rates recommended for this kind of work. Nevertheless there are now growing numbers of freelancers in search of work, and this together with the increasing number of overseas students in UK universities means that more of this kind of work will be commissioned, done and (hopefully) paid for.

There are also, of course, a growing number of agencies offering to “improve” students’ work. Some of the services offered far exceed what universities or indeed most professional proofreaders and copy-editors would see as legitimate intervention in work due to be submitted for assessment.

Free-market rules apply to the offer and purchase of such services, of course, and it’s up to the universities to police any consequent academic dishonesty. The problems are probably greater in undergraduate work, where students are being assessed on a series of smaller assignments.

Does proofreading improve grades?
From my own past experience as a marker or examiner I would be surprised to find that proofreading (as understood by professional colleagues) made a worrying difference to a student's grade. It might lift a miserable piece of work to what a colleague of mine used to refer to as a “good fail”, or maybe add a couple of percentage points to the grade for a sound or good assignment, but that's about it.

Where students submit purchased off-the-peg essays or assignments re-written by commercial agencies, the abrupt change in the writing style usually makes the dishonesty obvious. My experience lies in the Humanities and Social Sciences; I can't speak for scientists.

For (longer) postgraduate dissertations and theses it’s even more unlikely that extensive academic dishonesty through re-writing by a commercial agencies (or anybody else) would go undetected. Supervisors see samples of students’ writing over the whole period of the project and guide them in the development of the research and the structuring of the written dissertation. Any sudden last-minute change in fluency or “voice” would be highly suspicious.

A postgraduate thesis or dissertation depends upon extended and detailed research. Examiners are assessing that project as a whole, including its design, originality, how it contributes to academic knowledge in its field, its findings and how they are evaluated and discussed.

The standard of academic writing and presentation is important, but a conscientious and diligent research project will be evident to examiners despite awkward, ungrammatical prose in the final dissertation.

At the same time, the work of a proofreader in cleaning up (not re-writing) the thesis, done professionally and responsibly, is as much a service to the examiners and to future readers as to the student, whose hard work in planning, researching and shaping the argument is then better revealed in the written work. The crucial issue is transparency and clear guidelines.

The US and Australian approaches
In the USA the use of outside services seems more generally accepted, providing the extent of the intervention is disclosed. In Australia, a formal and extensive code of practice, the Australian Standards for Editing Practice (ASEP) (see Guidelines for Editing Research Theses download) is embedded in universities’ degree regulations.

Across the country therefore, students, supervisors, examiners and universities know what to expect and what level and what kind of intervention is acceptable. For example, the regulations for Macquarie University [3.1.2], referring to the levels of editing specified in the ASEP, state that supervisors should be aware that a student is using a professional editor, and that the intervention should be restricted to the detail of the text in language and illustration (Standard D) and completeness and consistency (Standard E). Any advice on structure (Standard C) should be provided only as exemplars (HDR Guide).

ASEP require that editing or proofreading should be carried out on hard copy so that students themselves have to consider each editorial suggestion and make the required change themselves. They also specify that the editor’s name and a statement of the service provided should be appended to the thesis.

The UK approach
In the UK, universities each set their own approach to the proofreading and copy-editing of students’ work. A quick straw poll of my academic colleagues and contacts showed that most had little knowing involvement with externally proofread theses. It can’t necessarily be assumed, however, that students were not availing themselves of outside services, only that they weren’t consulting with their academic supervisors about doing so.

Indeed, without clear guidelines and fully resourced practice much of the work of helping students improve their written English falls to academic supervisors, whose workloads have increased exponentially over the last few years. In the good old days, when academic routine generally included time for coffee and the broadsheets in the Senior Common Room, written English coaching was generally handled informally and could be passed down the line to keen junior (not infrequently female) members of staff.

It is rare these days that even the most dedicated supervisor has the time to work closely with a student, instructing on the written presentation of research. Dedicated study skills departments have filled some of this gap. Many universities provide high-quality ESL training that aims to equip students with the English language skills they need, but comparatively few have clear written policies or guidelines about proofreading.

A member of staff in one ESL department (in a university with no written guidelines or policy in this area) described to me how regularly they fend off requests from students to proofread or edit their work.

It’s not uncommon for UK PhD regulations to contain a statement such as this: “The thesis shall include a statement declaring the work to be the candidate’s own and acknowledging any assistance received” (University of Westminster Regulations, 14.3) but such provisions are generally aimed at situations such as in the sciences where a student’s PhD research forms part of a larger collaborative project.

Often general guidelines to students seek to remind them of the importance of error checking in the final stages of thesis preparation; for example, this from Reading University: “… leave yourself enough time to have a final read through of your dissertation to pick up any lingering mistakes or typos”.

It all sounds so easy. Or this from Birkbeck, apparently drafted with input from exasperated PhD examiners: “You must make every effort to correct errors before submission. It is not the task of examiners to act as editors and/or proof-readers [sic] of a thesis.”

Essentially, of course, a PhD thesis or Master’s dissertation is a form of examination and as such should be the student’s own work. At University College London the plagiarism regulations state that “Recourse to the services of … outside word-processing agencies which offer correction/improvement of English is strictly forbidden” (also quoted in M. Macdonald, EM, Jan/Feb 2008).

However, the situation varies, even within different colleges of London University. Currently (2012) the LSE issues guidance on students’ use of professional proofreading services, which is explicit and brief (see LSE). The key section states that a third-party external editor or proofreader cannot be used to develop ideas and arguments, to trim an over-long thesis to regulation length, to help with referencing or correct information, or to translate the thesis into English. What is permissible is for a proofreader to correct spelling and punctuation, to ensure correct grammar and syntax, to clarify the writing, for example by shortening sentences and changing to the active voice, to format footnotes and endnotes, and to make headings and page numbers consistent.

These guidelines do permit online proofreading using tracked changes, but require that the student be responsible for reviewing and accepting changes.

In the present situation, this sort of effort to render transparent the proofreading/editorial help received seems the most enlightened for all parties: students seeking to produce the best thesis they can, universities seeking to maintain academic quality and a good student experience, and proofreaders and editors seeking to earn a crust but also to maintain professional integrity and standards.

Current advice and moving forward ...
Professional organizations can also play a key role. The SfEP, for example, has a comprehensive published booklet (Proofreading Theses and Dissertations), aimed principally at members but more widely available. Excellent articles have also appeared in the society’s magazine, Editing Matters.

More, however, could be done, even though this would mean more work for the organization and its officers. Universities have departments that focus on study and research skills and also on supporting international students.

Making direct contact with such departments and encouraging them to have a direct link from their own web pages to a page on the SfEP website specifically addressed to dissertation/thesis writers would (a) promote the advantages to students in using the editing services of SfEP members and (b) provide useful information for students, supervisors and examiners about what SfEP proofreaders/editors expect from student authors.

Ultimately, spreading the kind of good practice adopted at LSE or working towards the kind of editing standards adopted in Australia would seem the most intelligent and practical way to manage this growing trend.

My thanks are due to Patrick McMahon, Judith Rowbotham, Mandy MacDonald, Louise Harnby, and to the collective wisdom of SfEP members on their discussion board.

Copyright Shani D’Cruze 2012

About Shani: After more than fifteen years as an academic historian in UK universities, Shani D'Cruze moved to Crete where she combines olive-farming with research and writing, editing, and copy-editing. View her LinkedIn profile.

15 Comments

Dafna Graf

20/6/2012 07:47:37 am

Thanks very much for this excellent post, Shani. It seems to me the issue is known and debated, but not always directly addressed or solved. Importantly, it's not only having more international students in English-speaking universities that makes a difference. It is the change in status of English, which is still taking place in our globalized world. I work in Germany, where the only language for writing academic contributions used to be German. This is changing dramatically. Many students are now studying in English, writing in English, and presenting in English. These are *not* international students. In fact, German students writing in English as ESL in Germany, do not even have the advantage of studying in an English-speaking environment, thus do not have as much useful linguistic input. I believe this to be true for many other countries as well, certainly in Western Europe.
The situation of an increasing number of undergraduates and graduates wishing/having to write in English, as a lingua franca, makes the necessity of proofreading/copy editing more and more apparent, specifically in regard to plagiarism. I personally believe that this is not only a matter of the copy editor's integrity (which is crucial), but also an issue for debate in each country's central academic councils.

Michael J Hunt link

16/7/2013 03:19:32 pm

I'll try to be brief, Shani (and Dafna)

I've been editing (not proofreading) dissertations and theses (not undergraduate eassays) for several years now. I have no qualifications, other than I'm a published fiction author and a lover of the language, I work on my own, am 'buried' in the lower regions of Google (which suits me fine, since I'm retired and don't have to earn a living).

Your article, Shani, raised several moot points, almost all of them I feel sure we would agree on, certainly on the technical side of academic editing. It's the ethical side that causes me some concern. You come from an academic background and probably (or possibly) see your 'client' as 'half university half student' (I know that's a gross simplification) whereas I have never been able to so much as discuss in general terms the ethics of what I do with an interested academic (I've tried, but it's the 'interested' bit that's been the problem). Coming from a non-academic background, I see the student alone as being my 'client'.

First of all, 95% of all my clients have been overseas students, and you cover their difficulties very well in your article. They have a huge amount in common when it comes to writing, one of these is their incredibly convoluted sentences and the constant repetition of the subject, which is often many words long. This combination results in many superfluous words - sometimes, in a long piece, amounting to several thousand. Therefore, it's impossible to edit the document without enhancing the quality of their work, and not just their writing, which automatically breaks one of the cardinal rules of the university.

Also, I cannot (hand on heart) say that I have never pointed out glaring errors in the 'professional' side of their work. You don't have to be an engineer or a social scientist or a whatever to spot mistakes in percentages, or comissions and omissions of crucial factors that you've become familiar with over a long edit. At first I used to steel myself to ignore them, but then I'd always go back and put a warning query (look at this! Take care with that!) in a Comment box.

Another thing that I've found is that almost all students come to me saying something like 'My supervisor has said I must have a proofread' (a euphemism for a socking great edit, I'm afraid). However, I warn all my clients at least twice (I have a 'letter of agreement' and I advise them in my first communication) to get approval for an external edit. Whether they do this, or whether they declare in their thesis that they've had an edit, I have no idea, since I never see the finished document.

And here I am, trying to be brief!

I'll leave it at that, other than to say that I appreciated your article and I hope you're enjoying Crete (a fair bit nicer than Manchester, I guess). I'm also on LinkedIn but I haven't a clue why!

Dafna, I've only worked for one German and she needed quite a big edit. I sympathise with your fellow students (I could imagine the uproar if English students were told to write in German!)

All the best to you both,

Michael (from Wigan)

Hapana Taka

6/3/2014 07:29:53 am

I understand that there are English proof-reading soft-ware packages available for subscription, any suggestion as to which is most effective?

Louise Harnby

6/3/2014 07:42:06 am

Hi Hapana.

Sorry, but I have no idea since I don't use them. There is some excellent software that I do use and that complements the human eye, for example consistency checkers such as PerfectIt (from Intelligent Editing): http://www.intelligentediting.com/standardversion.aspx.

Ruta Pandit

27/4/2014 03:46:03 am

Thank you for the information. I am a research scholar from India and English is a second language for me. I am studying entrepreneurship. I would like to improve on my research writing skills and generally be careful about my sentence formation, punctuation, commas and more. My guide has suggested that I follow the APA format. Can you suggest a online course which will help me assess my skills and guide me to improve on the above mentioned? Pl help.

29/4/2014 11:17:42 am

Hi Ruta - I'm sorry but I can't advise you. I only know about courses that deal with the more technical side of professional proofreading and editing. These are not writing-skills courses. Have you tried searching for relevant LinkedIn discussion groups?

Lesley Carson link

29/9/2014 05:56:49 am

This article and its comments are the best help for my current quandry! My services are designed for clinical authors' research manuscripts, mostly authors whose first language is not English, but recently I had an inquiry about proofreading a thesis. I was a little in the dark on the ethics...until now.
Thank you so much for the insight from an editor who has recently launched a freelance company.

29/9/2014 06:15:39 am

Hello Ruta, have you looked into what Coursera offers? You may find something close to what you are looking for.
I use the American Medical Association's (AMA) style guide and have found their website, with quizzes, helpful. There are many style guides that have APA instructions, perhaps there is one with an educational website.

Cliff Loriot

2/5/2015 07:03:15 am

Thank you for writing and posting this article.

I won't bore you with the details of my situation, but freelance proofreading seems to be the best option for me. However, I am scared to death to go into it because of the possibility of legal liability.

Would you recommend that a freelance proofreader establish a business to do freelance proofreading, consult an attorney regarding the wording of the contract, and obtain liability insurance in case a client sues for getting an unsatisfactory grade?

Thank you again.

4/5/2015 06:07:07 am

Hi Cliff. Some editorial freelancers do take out indemnity insurance, though many don't. If you don't have the confidence to write terms and conditions that make it clear what "proofreading" entails, and that you are absolutely not responsible for the substantive content of the work, then you probably should seek legal assistance from a professional who can help you with the wording. You mention the term "grade" so I'm assuming you're talking about student work. I can't imagine a scenario whereby a student would get an unsatisfactory grade because of a stray typo. Rather, it would be because the quality of the argument wasn't up to scratch. It isn't the proofreader's job to rewrite the student's work - that would be cheating on the student's part. You would therefore be advised to use your T&Cs to make it clear that you won't assist in plagiarism.

Certainly, your first port of call should be the website of your national editorial society to see what guidance they offer regarding liability and insurance for editorial freelancers, not just with regard to working for students, but clients more broadly.

4/5/2015 07:33:41 am

Thanks, Louise. I'm a very analytical, detail-oriented person and have taken graduate-level courses in law and ethics, so I have the confidence to write clear terms and conditions that will make the student responsible for their own content and argument.

My question concerned general practice in terms of legal liability, and your answer was helpful with regard to that issue.

Thanks again.

Kevin

20/8/2015 09:35:08 pm

I'm a professional editor. Most of my clients are graduate students and young professors working toward tenure. Some of them are tenured professors. I have often thought about these ethical issues. Here are some additional thoughts based on my experience.

My goal for all of my clients is to bring their writing up as close as possible to their level of subject expertise and their cognitive abilities. That differs according to the person's age and level and quality of education, with major differences between undergraduates, graduate students, and professors and also between universities of different ranks. The editing should be in keeping with those elements. For example, as a mature and fairly skilled writer, I would never edit an undergraduate paper to my own writing skill level.

I keep fairly strict ethical standards for undergraduates. I work with them through a multi-step interactive process of planning, writing, revising, and editing that is an intense LEARNING PROCESS. You have to understand that U.S. high schools are not doing a very good job of teaching writing. It is well known that many students enter university lacking the necessary literacy skills and require remedial instruction. Well, I can tell you that this problem persists right through the master's thesis, the PhD dissertation, AND BEYOND. At no level do my clients feel they've been adequately prepared by their previous education for the tasks demanded of them. They somehow muddle their way through the master's thesis and dissertation feeling quite confused and frightened. Then when they are hired by a university to teach they have no idea how to go about writing the book and articles that are required for tenure. Virtually none of my clients know how to write a clear topic statement and an outline. No one ever taught them this basic skill in their 20 or more years of education. In the U.S. the reasons for this have to do with the shift from teaching reading and writing mechanics to teaching reading and writing process, with an emphasis on meaning rather than form. They are taught free-form writing that lacks purpose and direction.

So in my opinion it is ethical and necessary for the editor to take on the role of teacher so that at some point these lost students gain the skills they need to function independently. In this role I constantly push my clients to revise and perfect their writing before I copyedit it. When they’ve done their best I correct mechanical errors and limit myself to very light style editing, so that the final result is, I hope, 95% the student’s work and I have raised it only one notch with my final edit. But my role in prompting content revisions, through margin queries, is major and seems to go beyond what seems ethical outside the U.S.

Nonnative English writers do present a very special challenge, but my goal for them is the same: to raise their level of English as close as possible to their subject knowledge, while also giving them the writing skills needed by all students. Here the editor’s teaching role is unmistakable.

And finally, young professors are also a special case. Much is demanded of them, especially at elite universities. For tenure, an assistant professor at a top-tier school MUST publish a book with a top-tier press. But getting that elite book contract is near impossible and requires not months but years of writing, revising, and editing the book, sending out endless proposals, and doing endless revisions for persnickety reviewers. It has become apparent to me that academic publishing in the U.S. revolves largely around personalities, politics, and egos, without much regard for the quality of young scholars’ books and the immensity of their efforts. These scholars need all the help I can give them, and I supply it liberally, knowing that their careers hang in the balance. Here I do extensive content editing, but that always begins with in-depth feedback to the young authors so they can make their own revisions. We exchange the manuscript dozens of times until the content is shipshape. It is a long collaborative process––the same process I use with nonacademic nonfiction authors.

That raises the question, if professors themselves need extensive editing, should it be withheld from undergraduate and graduate students? I do hold students to a high standard of independence because they are expected to demonstrate subject knowledge and writing ability for their grades. But in the end, the needs of my clients from undergraduate to tenured professor are very similar. It’s just that it’s sort of a secret that tenured professors often use editors.

My sense after reading the above article is that ethical standards for editing are much stricter outside the U.S. In the U.S. the biggest problem is not editors, but the buying and selling of academic papers. This is illegal in approximately 37 states, as it should be. It is extremely disconcerting that studen

20/8/2015 09:40:13 pm

Sorry, I guess I exceeded the length limit. Here's the tail end of my post:

It is extremely disconcerting that students at all levels, even in law school and medical school, purchase papers and pay people to do all of their course work and take their exams for them. Just image that the surgeon who is operating on you bought his way through school like that! This is a major social menace in the professions that relate to health and safety. For that reason, I feel that what I do is ethical: I am at all times spurring students on to increase their effort and their skills so that they can in the long run meet academic expectations more independently.

In the U.S., some universities actually REQUIRE their PhD dissertation students to work with an editor, especially if English is not their second language. This makes the process and the end result better for both students and those who must read their dissertations. So while I strongly support ethics in editing, the above article and my own experience show that there is more than one valid way to think about what constitutes ethical editing.

Finally, consider the fact that in the U.S., top schools like MIT, Stanford, and so on attract thousands of top students and professors from foreign countries. Obviously we need these people’s intelligence and knowledge to hold up the quality of our universities. And there are nonnative English speakers in top levels of government, business, and industry across the U.S. ALL of these people need some degree of help with their English writing. So while holding younger non-English students to high standards, we should not treat them too harshly. We now live in a globalized society that needs to accommodate people of different language backgrounds in order to both ease their integration into institutions and so that we can benefit from their knowledge.

Reshu Agarwal link

3/10/2017 01:04:06 pm

That was really helpful. thanks

Jon

5/4/2020 12:19:25 pm

Old post but a perennial issue for universities and academic tutors. While I have nothing against those who work as proofreaders in general, I advise all students to avoid using such services for their formal assignments, for reasons I will touch on in more detail.

Part of the process of academic study is to learn to communicate well enough to negotiate a professional career, either in a research environment or the workplace. Students are expected to have a level of fluency in their language of study and an ability to produce academic writing. If they don't, they need to improve. This doesn't just apply to those who have it as a second language, there is also the style of formal academic writing which all students need to learn.

Yes, students conducting excellent research may need help to improve their language skills in order to convey clear meaning. A decent tutor and good feedback should provide indications as to where the problems lie and how they might be resolved to improve understanding. Importantly however, they don't make the corrections for the student. The greater problem arises with students who probably lack the ability in the first place and simply defer to proofreaders to correct their work rather than seeking to improve themselves. Fault also lies with professional editors who go beyond the barely acceptable remit of highlighting spelling and grammatical errors to prove readability. As mentioned in an earlier post, any form of editing assistance (assuming the editor actually knows what they are doing) will improve the work. That is inevitable.

The first question, is using such services a reasonable adjustment or is it unfair assistance? As the work is no longer the sole product of the student, many would consider this in the realm of unfair assistance. (Yes, there may be exceptions if research is part of a group project.)

The second question, should students with poor language skills be passing advanced courses because they received assistance? Students who seek professional services and leave with flawed-language skills are left exposed when they attempt to start their careers. "Fake it til you make" it is not a good attitude in an environment where integrity is crucial. This also becomes a failure of the academic institution.

Third question, are professional editors to students a genuine service or a parasite? These services target student's fears. Many are taking money and providing a terrible service, if any at all. They also generally know they are against the institutions academic code of conduct, so the student can't do anything if defrauded, or risk being exposed and sanctioned by their institution.

Lastly, it may provide a justification for professional editors in what they do, but stop conflating education with publication. Established academics may have their research edited because they are seeking publication - not academic accreditation. This is a non-trivial degree of separation between editing work created as part of one's education and work that is intended to influence the field of study. A student thesis (assuming the requirements of academic rigour and interest are met) transforms into a publishable paper, it doesn't begin as one. Marks for poor(er) language skills are generally unlikely to result in a rejected thesis, and if they do, it's because the errors are so fundamental that the text can't be understood - a language deficiency that the student needs to remedy. Established researchers may seek input into their work from a proofreader who also knows and understands their field, and can assist in developing language attuned to a specific audience. This is completely acceptable and yes, desirable! We hold students to different standards as their work is part of their education.

Proofreaders for university student papers - definite no-no. Proofreaders used in a professional context or where explicitly allowed - I have no problems with. They are extremely valuable and I use them regularly as I am a publisher of both academic and technical works.