[niteskie]

Plagiarism In University: How To Avoid It and What Happens If You Get Caught

BY AUDRIANA ANDREWS, INSIDERS AGENT

When you are in university it is very important that you site your sources and not commit plagiarism on an assignment. Plagiarism has way bigger consequences in university than it did in high school so it is important to make sure that you avoid doing it.

Checking To See If You Plagiarized

There are many things that you can do to check to see if you are plagiarizing. First of all check that what you have written are your own words and thoughts. If you did use someone else's words though that is fine as long as you acknowledge this and cite your sources through footnotes/endnotes or some other type of reference. If you paraphrase what someone else has said make sure that you completely re-write it. Changing just one word or sentence is not enough and is considered plagiarizing. Actually it is often the easiest way to get caught. Another form of plagiarism that is often overlooked is submitting the same assignment for two different courses. The only way you can do this is if you get permission from the professor in the second course. Lastly it is very important that you do not copy anyone else's work.

Referencing Your Work

Make sure that you acknowledge any information that you get from any source no matter what source it is. If you are unsure of how to reference something make sure that you ask questions. The most important person for you to ask questions to would be your professor for the assignment in question. Usually each professor you have will have different expectations of how they want you to cite sources in their course. Their will method should be explained in the course outline or in class.

How do they know?

You must be wondering how professors check to see if you have plagiarized. Mcmaster University uses a site called Turnitin.com. Basically what happens is that students submit their assignment there and it checks for similar or identical work. If Turnitin finds similar work it sends a report to your professor showing your assignment as well as the identical work that it found. Your professor will then review the report and determines whether or not there is a problem.

What Happens If You Get Caught

If you are charged with plagiarism there are two possible outcomes:

1. Your instructor may reduce your grade in the class or give you a zero on the assignment that you plagiarized.

2. You may have to attend a hearing in front of a Faculty Adjudicator who has the authority to give an F on a course, suspension or expulsion from university.

To appeal an instructor's decision to reduce your grade on an assignment you can fill out an Dishonesty Appeals Form(http://www.mcmaster.ca/academicinteg.../appeals.html). You must submit it within three weeks of the date of the decision.

More Info

To find out more information about plagiarizing specifically at Mcmaster University please check here: http://mcmaster.ca/academicintegrity...n ts/index.html
Remember if you are unsure of whether or not to reference something do it anyways. It's better to be safe than sorry.

[lorend]

When in doubt, cite. ALWAYS!

You can't get in trouble for over-citing.

[micadjems]

I had a floormate in first year that lent her paper to a friend on the floor to help her with an assignment - she ended up copying the whole thing and they were both in trouble.

DONT hand around your work!

[DavidR]

There was an instance in my policy class last year where a graduate had provided a current student with his work. They had his degree revoked and he lost his job.

Keep that in mind

[IbrahimH]

Originally Posted by DavidR

There was an instance in my policy class last year where a graduate had provided a current student with his work. They had his degree revoked and he lost his job.

Keep that in mind

Wowwww OMG I can't even imagine how devastating that must've been!

[sew12]

Originally Posted by IbrahimH

Wowwww OMG I can't even imagine how devastating that must've been!

I can't imagine how stupid that graduate was in the first place.

[Mowicz]

I had to sit in on an academic integrity course a few weeks back (only to find out that academic integrity in Math isn't....so...stringe nt. I mean, I don't really need to cite a theorem if I'm proving it right? Haha), and despite being a bit bored, I did hear some good stuff.

The presentation for the course can be found here (http://www.mcmaster.ca/academicinteg...es/sgs101.html)

Might be worth reading through, particularly to those students who do a lot of essay writing, and they do have a section on research ethics for any students wishing to do research later on in their careers.