hi everyone,

i wrote an essay a bit ago and i'm worried that i didn't paraphrase enough. i cited everything, but still. what happens if i get a 0 on the essay? am i notified before i get my mark back?

depending on severity of the plagiarizing. Nothing could happen to you, you could get a zero, or worse comes to worse you could be kicked out of university.

Relax. If you cited everything, you'll be fine.

Citation basically means "I stole this from this source". You'll be fine.

Citation will generally keep you safe (especially in every first year course I've ever heard about). And even if you are caught for academic dishonesty, the first time is just a warning (unless it's insanely severe somehow that they have to rework the rules just for your case, but I fully doubt yours is that).

Depending on what the specific infraction is, you may get a notation on your transcript that simply says "DISHONEST." This is, of course, highly detrimental to future success and so academic dishonesty is not advised.

However from your description it sounds as though you tried to give credit where due in good faith, if there ever were a dispute you could likely defend your actions. Intent is a huge part of academic dishonesty cases...If you had improperly sourced or not paraphrased enough, your TA (etc.) would likely just provide you with the supports needed to remediate this issue, so long as it was not deliberately done.

If you didn't deliberately cheat, you won't get busted. The tribunal/professors/etc. are surprisingly adept at identifying real cheating.