Avoiding Plagiarism

DEFINITION: The mission of Bard College at Simon's Rock is to serve as a means to encourage the development of students’ own thinking. In being assigned papers, students are asked to take in information and produce their own interpretations. Plagiarism is using someone else’s wording as your own without acknowledging your source. It is a serious form of cheating, defined ethically, pedagogically and legally.

Plagiarism occurs when a student downloads an entire paper from the web or purchases a pre-made paper. It also happens when a student cuts and pastes pieces of another person’s writing into his or her paper without citing the source. It is a legal violation whether or not the student is aware of her/his misuse.

POLICY: The Simon’s Rock Student Handbook (p. 12-13 under "Code of Student Conduct") defines the college’s position. A student who plagiarizes will earn, at the very least, an automatic F for the assignment. The student may also immediately fail the course. At the second occurrence, plagiarism will become part of the student’s permanent record and may lead to suspension.

HOW TO AVOID PLAGIARISM:

• As you prepare to write your paper: read other sources and in your own notes, keep track of what other authors say by using quotation marks and indicate the page numbers from which passages are borrowed as well as the fully identified source for any piece of info or interpretation you are writing down.
• Use quotation marks around any words, even a phrase, that belongs to another author.
• Cite the author whose ideas you represent. Use a recognized citation style such as MLA, APA or Turabian.
• When you find information or ideas you want to utilize, you are encouraged to paraphrase (use your own words). Even there, however, you should provide an endnote to the source you use. Use your own sentence structure rather than replicate the author’s pattern of ideas.
• Keep focused on what argument YOU want to make, rather than letting your writing be dictated by too much citation of other authorities. An outline will help you create a trajectory of your paper.
• The basic factual info about an artist’s life, unless there is doubt or controversy surrounding it, does not need to be cited. Do not cite common knowledge.
• As you write your paper, if you have any doubt about whether you should document your ideas, please provide an endnote to the source of information. Remember to consult with your professor or with Writing Center tutors.

Our special thanks to Dr. Joan DelPlato for her help in preparing this page.