Rubbish sent back by one university to a plagiarist (8)
I believe the answer is:
imitator
'a plagiarist' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'rubbish sent back by one university' is the wordplay.
I cannot really see how this works, but
'rubbish' could be 'tat' (low-quality items or material) and 'tat' is found within the answer.
'one' could be 'o' (I've seen this in other clues) and 'o' is found in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
'to' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for imitator that I've seen before include "Copier, mimic" , "parrot" , "Copycat" , "follower" , "One who mimics or emulates" .)