Academic Experience: Plagiarism

Plagiarism is considered intellectual theft. It is the act of presenting another's ideas as your own without appropriate academic citation. It is considered a misuse of information and has been recognized as a violation of copyright law. It is taken very seriously in the classroom; students who are caught plagiarizing can be penalized by failure. See page 20 of the Student Handbook for a description of other actions constituting academic dishonesty.

As more and more students use the web and other electronic information sources to do research where cutting and pasting is easy, the potential for plagiarism is enormous. Keep in mind that as easy as it is for students to find and copy information from the web, it is just as easy for instructors to find the same information.

To avoid plagiarizing:

When you take ideas or quote from a source, you must paraphrase accurately and give credit by appropriately citing the original source.

If you take a sentence or phrase directly from a source, you must indicate it by using quotation marks around the direct quote and citing the original source.

Because of paging and other issues, citing online sources can be confusing. A number of newer citation sources, such as the sixth edition of the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers and the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, fifth edition, go into detail on the best way to accurately cite electronic sources. Also, review the Citing Sources pages of this guide for guidance on developing citations.

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