Plagiarism

"Academic integrity means being responsible for the quality of your work, preparing it honestly and respecting the intellectual community you are part of as a student. It is a core value in all scholarly work." (Academic Integrity: Student's Guide)

Academic Fraud

According to the University of Ottawa, academic fraud refers to "any act by a student that may result in a distorted academic evaluation for that student or another student. Academic fraud includes but is not limited to activities such as:

• plagiarising or cheating in any way;
• submitting work not partially or fully the student’s own, excluding properly cited quotations and references. Such work includes assignments, essays, tests, exams, research reports and theses, regardless of whether the work is in written, oral or another form;
• presenting research data that are forged, falsified or fabricated;
• attributing a statement of fact or reference to a fabricated source;
• submitting the same work or a large part of the same piece of work in more than one course, or a thesis or any other piece of work submitted elsewhere without the prior approval of the appropriate professors or academic units;
• falsifying or misrepresenting an academic evaluation, using a forged or altered supporting document or facilitating the use of such a document;
• taking any action aimed at falsifying an academic evaluation." (Academic Regulation 14)

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is the incorrect use of source material, whether it is intentional or not. More specifically, it is the non-referenced use of words, ideas and facts taken from the literature. Plagiarism is therefore a form of academic fraud that involves a student who claims ownership of another author's intellectual property.

If you use another author's words or ideas to support your own (or if you use passages taken from a paper that you have previously submitted in another class), you must add a reference that includes the bibliographic information needed to locate the original source. Otherwise, you are compromising academic integrity and could be accused of plagiarism. Various sanctions can apply depending on the case.

Take this quiz to test your understanding. (Under construction)