from Student Advising Handbook: Academic Rules and Regulations

Plagiarism Defined

In academic writing you are often asked to draw on the work of other writers, composers, artists, speakers, or filmmakers when explaining or supporting your judgments. Academic ethics and fairness require you to properly cite these sources. If you represent a source's language, ideas, or images as your own even inadvertently you practice a form of academic dishonesty called plagiarism.

Plagiarism is using a source's words, ideas, or images without acknowledging the original writer, composer, or artist. It can be as blatant as copying long passages from a source without quotation marks and proper citation. One of the most common forms is "mosaic plagiarism," the act of sprinkling borrowed phrases, partial sentences, or sentences within the paper without using quotation marks.

Plagiarism can be avoided with strategies such as:

• using quotation marks and a proper citation when using the source's own language
• citing the source of ideas when you summarize or paraphrase a passage in your own words
• citing the source of tables, charts, diagrams, or other visuals
• citing the source of data you use to construct a table
• citing the source of specific examples and facts

Plagiarism is a serious academic offense and is a violation of the Social Contract. Academic dishonesty may result in penalties as severe as expulsion from your academic program or even from the college.

For additional information about this policy, see Rights and Responsibilities: Yours and Ours (available from the Office of the Vice-President for Student Affairs).

The Learning Resource Center can assist you in avoiding academic dishonesty. Handouts are available on documentation styles, and writing tutors can help with citation specifics.