Skip to Main Content

Plagiarism Tutorial

Plagiarism

Consequences of Plagiarism

Having completed the self-assessment PowerPoint, you have learned that there are several types of plagiarism, some obvious and some quite tricky. We're sure you already knew that buying a paper online or re-submitting a friend’s paper are forms of plagiarism. But did you know that you can commit plagiarism by:

  • using someone else’s idea (even if you express it in your own words) and not citing the original source?
  • forgetting quotation marks?
  • taking a short passage from another source and not re-writing it completely in your own words?

The Consequences at Walsh

The penalties for academic dishonesty at Walsh vary in severity, and range from failure on a specific test or assignment, reduced course grade, failure of the course, probation, suspension, to dismissal from a program or from the University. Details can be found in the University Catalog under Academic Policies and Procedures. As you've seen in the Jayson Blair and Don Polderman examples, students who cheat become adults who cheat - often with serious consequences.

How Can Plagiarism Be Avoided?

The remainder of this tutorial is designed to give you skills and knowledge to help you avoid committing plagiarism. In the first section you'll learn about the importance of citing your sources properly. In the second section you'll learn about other skills such as note-taking and paraphrasing which will help protect you from stumbling accidentally into the plagiarism trap.