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Plagiarism is when you use the
ideas or writings of another as your own, without giving credit to
the author. It is a serious violation of academic integrity and can
have severe consequences, including expulsion at some colleges and
universities. Plagiarism may be intentional, such as copying from a
web site or buying a research paper, or, as is more often the case,
unintentional-failure to cite sources or failure to paraphrase
appropriately. There are many good web sites which explain more
about plagiarism, how to avoid it, and include exercises on how to
paraphrase.
Plagiarism, from the University of Missouri:
http://www.missouri.edu/~pattonmd//plag.html
Paraphrasing:
http://web.missouri.edu/~commpjb/MoreSupport/Paraphrasing/paraphrasing.html
Avoiding Plagiarism, from the Purdue Online Writing Lab:
http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/research/r_plagiar.html
Teachers are aware of the
many paper mills which sell or give away papers on a variety of
topics. These include dozens of sites such as the following:
Do not be tempted to
cheat/plagiarize by using these papers. They are not of the same
quality as your work and it is obvious that they don't speak with
your voice. Remember that intentional plagiarism is an especially
serious violation of academic integrity.
RASG faculty are committed to
helping students cite their sources and understand how to avoid
plagiarism. All departments cite sources using the same
bibliographic format.
Faculty members are also designing assignments to help students
avoid plagiarism and showcase their own thinking. They might follow
some of these suggestions and techniques:
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Become
familiar with online sites for reports and research papers |
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Search the
Internet for originals of suspected plagiarized papers. |
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Use a
research process with many intermediate steps. |
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Frequently review collaboration guidelines, paraphrasing,
quoting, plagiarism with students. |
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Include
unique requirements (an interview, survey, experiment, own
opinion). |
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Use topics
that are individual for each class, and may be narrowly focused
or very current or have specific components. |
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Discuss the
benefits of citing sources and review the bibliography format
early and often. |
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Use an alternative to a
written paper, such as an oral conversation, debate, diary,
newspaper, editorial, flowchart, diorama, quilt, comic strip,
brochure, web page, video, game, or spreadsheet of an issue.
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