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Plagiarism Policies and Procedure | Types of Plagiarism

Procedures for Addressing Plagiarism, Academic Dishonesty, and Problematic Behavior

Whether you are a first-time teacher or a seasoned professor, please read over the following rules and procedures governing academic dishonesty and student behavior. These procedures have changed over the years, so please be sure that you are aware of the current set. They are designed to ensure the students' rights to due process, but they also will create an orderly and clear way of addressing plagiarism cases that ultimately will benefit the instructor as well.

Plagiarism and Other Acts of Academic Dishonesty

  1. Read the College of Liberal Arts Statement on Academic Integrity, which can be found at: http://www.la.psu.edu/assocdea/academicinteg.htm
  2. Be sure you include in your syllabus a clear and specific explanation of how you intend to apply these standards in your class. Call your students' attention to this explanation on the first day of class and reinforce this explanation shortly before students do an assignment where they might be tempted to plagiarize. It may be helpful to assign a reading specifically addressing plagiarism and/or an exercise intended to get them used to academic standards of using and documenting outside sources. Remember, some of your students might not have ever had to cite sources, or might have been given misinformation at the high school level about when and how to use outside materials.

    Overall, the best way to deal with dishonesty is to forestall it. Make sure that students are aware of your academic integrity expectations, and that you have given clear instructions on how to meet them.

  3. When you suspect an act of academic dishonesty, most importantly, be certain that you are right! A simple hunch that the student's words are not his/her own is not good enough, even though you may well be right. Find specific evidence of the plagiarism: in other words, locate the source of as many as possible of the plagiarized passages, and make a copy of the original source. For Internet plagiarism, often the source can be located by searching for three or four consecutive words in the suspect passage, using a metasearch engine such as www.google.com. There are also a variety of sites now (such as www.plagiarism.org) that will locate originals in online databases such as www.schoolsucks.com and "The Evil House of Cheat" (www.cheathouse.com).

    For other types of academic dishonesty, be sure that you have evidence that would convince a neutral third party of the student's guilt.

  4. Notify the student that you suspect him or her of academic dishonesty and offer to discuss the matter. Ideally, this notification would be done face-to-face, but if this is inconvenient or impossible (as with a final exam or term paper), then e-mail is adequate, with a letter to the student's home address if the email produces no answer. Do not at this time:

    • unilaterally impose an academic sanction on or take any punitive action against the student (failure of an assignment, failure of the course, or something else), or
    • tell the student that he or she must drop the course or has been removed from the course.
  5. Go to the College of Liberal Arts Statement on Academic Integrity (http://www.la.psu.edu/assocdea/academicinteg.htm), or directly to the "College of Liberal Arts Academic Integrity Form," which can be found at: http://www.la.psu.edu/assocdea/AcademicIntegForm.htm

    Print up the "College of Liberal Arts Academic Integrity Form" and fill it out. The form asks you for the name of the student and course, and a brief description of your charges against the student, as well as your proposed sanction. (Or, if you're having trouble with the College's web site, just ask Kim Keller or another staff member in 103 Burrowes to print one up for you.)

  6. If the student wishes, meet with him or her and listen to the explanation. You may wish to have a neutral third party present during this discussion. Be aware that some cases of plagiarism are committed out of ignorance rather than the desire to deceive, and sometimes it is sufficient punishment only to give the student notice and ask for a revision more clearly acknowledging sources. However, it is the student's responsibility to understand and follow standards stated in your syllabus and class materials, so ignorance need not be accepted as a valid excuse.
  7. If you still feel the matter needs formal sanctions after discussing the matter with the student, explain the sanction you are recommending and why you feel it is valid. Give the Academic Integrity Form to the student, who needs to sign it, choosing either not to contest the charges made on the form, or to contest them. (The student may also choose to contest the sanction if he or she feels it is too extreme for the infraction.) If necessary, the student has three days in which to make a decision, or to change a decision made at this time.
  8. Whether the student accepts or contests the matter, sign the form yourself and forward it to Kim or to me, and we will process it from there. If there is a hearing, we may need to ask you for information on the case, so you should retain in your possession the original paper and any source material you found documenting the infraction. In such a case when the student has contested the charge, the College of Liberal Arts will likely ask the instructor for an account from his/her perspective and possibly for clarifications. It is possible that the instructor will need to attend a review. Otherwise, you're done. If the student is cheating in multiple classes, the College will now know it.

    The sanction will either be the one you proposed, or another one that the Academic Integrity Committee or Office of Judicial Affairs chooses, but the procedure will make you immune to endless appeals and complaints, since it will now be out of your hands.

    Note: The form allows you to propose academic sanctions, but also gives you the option of proposing a disciplinary sanction. These are penalties over and beyond the grade in the course and could extend to expulsion or the recording of an "XF" or "Failure due to Dishonesty" on the student's permanent transcript. In severe cases, such as theft of papers or examinations, these added sanctions may be justified. Check with me before proposing such a sanction. College guidelines note that such recommendations are forwarded to the Office of Judicial Affairs for review and final determination.


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Problematic or Disruptive Student Behavior

Behavior problems must be addressed in a way similar to the procedures outlined above for academic dishonesty cases, though rather than falling under the Academic Integrity policies, they fall under the "Code of Conduct" procedures (see http://www.sa.psu.edu/ja/codeconduct.html). The following clauses should be your guideline:

"9. Obstruction or disruption of classes, research projects, or other activities or programs of the University; or obstructing access to University facilities, property, or programs (Policy Statement 1)."

And, of course:

"1. Physically harming or threatening to harm any person, intentionally or recklessly causing harm to any person, or reasonable apprehension of such harm or creating a condition that endangers the health and safety or self or others (also see Policy Statement 8)."

When you first realize that a student is behaving inappropriately (again, don't wait until the end of the semester to do this) intervene immediately.

Do not:

  • unilaterally impose a sanction on the student (failure of an assignment, failure of the course, or something else), or
  • tell the student that he or she must drop the course or has been removed from the course.

Instead:

  • Act immediately. The longer you wait, the more problematic the behavior may become.
  • Meet with the student privately as soon as the behavior has occurred. Do not simply email the student about his or her behavior, as email is all-too-easy to ignore or downplay. If you are concerned about your safety in a private meeting with the student, inform me immediately ; I will help you make arrangements that will insure your safety (which is my highest concern). If the student is in the major, you may wish to have me present during the meeting anyway, if it seems useful to you. At this meeting:

    • inform the student of the inappropriateness of his or her behavior, and demand that it cease immediately; and
    • explain to the student that if the behavior continues, you will file a complaint with the Office of Judicial Affairs, which will call the student in for a consultation and then determine if a sanction is appropriate.
  • After the meeting, follow up with a letter reiterating the nature of the problem, and what you are requiring the student to do to end the problem.
  • If the problematic behavior continues, file a complaint with the Office of Judicial Affairs. Please inform me that you are taking this step, so that I will have a record of the situation. Judicial Affairs will inform you of their decision, and will determine if you can remove the student from your class.
  • Please note: If a student is committing any violent act or threatening violence in class or against you at any other moment, call, or have a student call the campus police at 863-1111 or call 911. Don't call me or anyone else first-call for help immediately.
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Preparing Syllabus Statements on These Issues

Do: have statements on your syllabus explaining that cases of academic dishonesty will be addressed by the College Academic Integrity Committee and possibly by the Office of Judicial Affairs, and that inappropriate or abusive behavior will be dealt with by the Office of Judicial Affairs.

Do not: make statements on your syllabus threatening your own unilateral sanctions for dishonesty or behavior problems. You can be clear that there will be serious consequences for such behavior, but that those sanctions will be determined by the Academic Integrity Committee or the Office of Judicial Affairs.

To help you construct syllabi that contain all the information they need to contain, and to give you some suggestions for wording, please take a look at the following two web sites:

  1. The College's web page on syllabi: http://www.la.psu.edu/assocdea/syllabus.htm
  2. The Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching's guidelines on "Preparing a Syllabus": http://www.psu.edu/celt/PST/syllabus.html
  3. Again, the address for the College's Academic Integrity Statement is: http://www.la.psu.edu/assocdea/academicinteg.htm
  4. Again, the address for the "Code of Conduct" is: http://www.sa.psu.edu/ja/codeconduct.html

Mark Morrisson, Director of Undergraduate Studies
Last updated 10 April 2002

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Types of Plagiarism

The Department of English insists on strict standards of academic honesty in all courses. Therefore, plagiarism, the act of passing off someone else's words or ideas as your own, will be penalized severely. The following discussion is offered so that you won't commit plagiarism.

Sometimes plagiarism is simple dishonesty. If you buy, borrow, or steal an essay to turn in as your own work, you are plagiarizing. If you copy word-for-word or change a word here and there while copying without enclosing the copied passage in quotation marks and identifying the author, you are also plagiarizing.

But plagiarism can be more complicated in act and intent.

Paraphrasing, stating someone else's ideas in your own words, can lead you to unintentional plagiarism. Jotting down notes and ideas from sources and then using them without proper attributions to the authors or titles in introductory phrases may result in a paper that is only a blend of your words combined with the words of others that appear to be yours.

Another way to plagiarize is to allow other students or friends to give you too much rhetorical help or do too much editing and proofreading of your work. If you think you have received substantial help in any way from people whose names will not appear as authors of the paper, you should acknowledge that help in a short sentence at the end of the paper or in your list of Works Cited. If you are not sure how much help is too much, talk with your instructor, so the two of you can decide what kind of outside help (and how much) is acceptable, and how to give credit where credit is due.

As you go through the writing process, you should keep careful track of when you use ideas and/or exact words from sources. As a conscientious writer, you have to make an honest effort to distinguish between your own ideas, those of others, and what might be considered common knowledge. Try to identify which part of your work comes from an identifiable source and then document the use of that source using the proper format, such as a parenthetical citation and a Works Cited list. If you are unsure about what needs documenting, talk with your instructor.

When thinking about plagiarism, it is hard to avoid talking about ideas as if they were objects like tables and chairs. Obviously, that's not the case. You should not feel that you are under pressure to invent completely new ideas. Instead, original writing consists of thinking through ideas and expressing them in your own way. The result may not be entirely new, but, if honestly done, it may be interesting and worthwhile reading. Print or electronic sources, as well as other people, may add useful ideas to your own thoughts. When they do so in identifiable and specific ways, give them the credit they deserve.

The following examples should clarify the difference between dishonest and proper uses of sources.

The Source

The US has only lost approximately 30 percent of its original forest area, most of this in the nineteenth century. The loss has not been higher mainly because population pressure has never been as great there as in Europe. The doubling of US farmland from 1880 to 1920 happened almost without affecting the total forest area as most was converted from grasslands.

From Bjorn Lomborg, The Skeptical Environmentalist

Word-for-Word Plagiarizing

In the following example, the writer tacks on a new opening part of the first sentence in the hope that the reader won't notice that the rest of the paragraph is simply copied from the source. The plagiarized words are italicized. Despite the outcry from environmentalist groups like Earth First! and the Sierra Club, it is important to note that the US has only lost approximately 30 percent of its original forest area, most of this in the nineteenth century. The loss has not been higher mainly because population pressure has never been as great here as in Europe. The doubling of US farmland from 1880 to 1920 happened almost without affecting the total forest area as most was converted from grasslands.

Quotation marks around all the copied text, followed by a parenthetical citation, would avoid plagiarism in this case. But even if that were done, a reader might wonder why so much was quoted from Lomborg in the first place. Beyond that, a reader might wonder why you chose to use a quote here instead of paraphrase this passage, which as a whole is not very quotable, especially with the odd reference to Europe. Using exact quotes should be reserved for situations where the original author has stated the idea in a better way than any paraphrase you might come up with. In the above case, the information could be summed up and simply paraphrased, with a proper citation, because the idea, even in your words, belongs to someone else. Furthermore, a paper consisting largely of quoted passages and little original writing would be relatively worthless.

Plagiarizing by Paraphrase

In the following case, the exact ideas in the source are followed very closely-too closely-simply by substituting your own words and sentences for those of the original.

ORIGINAL
PARAPHRASE
The US has only lost approximately 30 percent of its forest area, most of this in the nineteenth century. Only 30 percent of the original forest area has been lost.
The loss has not been higher mainly because population pressure has never been as great there as in Europe. Europe has fared slightly worse due to greater population pressure.
The doubling of US farmland from 1880 to 1920 happened almost without affecting the total forest area as most was converted from grasslands. Even though US farmland doubled from 1880 to 1920, little forest area was affected since the farms appeared on grasslands.

The ideas in the right column appear to be original. Obviously, they are just Lomborg's ideas presented in different words without any acknowledgement. Plagiarism can be avoided easily here by introducing the paraphrased section with an attribution to Lomborg and then following up with a parenthetical citation. Such an introduction is underlined here:

Bjorn Lomborg points out that despite environmentalists' outcries. . . . (page number).

Properly used, paraphrase is a valuable rhetorical technique. You should use it to simplify or summarize so that others' ideas or information, properly attributed in the introduction and documented in a parenthetical citation, may be woven into the pattern of your own ideas. You should not use paraphrase simply to avoid quotation; you should use it to express another's important ideas in your own words when those ideas are not expressed in a way that is useful to quote directly.

Mosaic Plagiarism

This is a more sophisticated kind of plagiarism wherein phrases and terms are lifted from the source and sprinkled in among your own prose. Words and phrases lifted verbatim or with only slight changes are italicized: Environmentalist groups have long bemoaned the loss of US forests, particularly in this age of population growth and urbanization. Yet, the US has only lost approximately 30 percent of its original forest area, and most of this in the nineteenth century . There are a few main reasons for this. First, population pressure has never been as great in this country as in Europe . Second, the explosion of US farmland, when it doubled from 1880 to 1920, happened almost without affecting the total forest area as most was converted from grasslands .

Mosaic plagiarism may be caused by sloppy notetaking, but it always looks thoroughly dishonest and intentional and will be judged as such. In the above example, just adding an introduction and a parenthetical citation will not solve the plagiarism problem since no quotation marks are used where required. But adding them would raise the question of why those short phrases and basic statements of fact and opinion are worth quoting word for word. The best solution is to paraphrase everything: rewrite the plagiarized parts in your own words, introduce the passage properly, and add a parenthetical citation.

Summary

Using quotation marks around someone else's words avoids the charge of plagiarism, but when overdone, makes for a patchwork paper with little flow to it. When most of what you want to say comes from a single source, either quote directly or paraphrase. In both cases, introduce your borrowed words or ideas by attributing them to the author and then follow them with a parenthetical citation.

The secret of using sources productively is to make them work for you to support and amplify your ideas. If you find, as you work at paraphrasing, quoting, and citing, that you are only pasting sources together with a few of your own words and ideas thrown in-that too much of your paper comes from your sources and not enough from your own mind-then go back and start over. Try rewriting the paper without looking at your sources, just using your own ideas; after you have completed a draft entirely of your own, add the specific words and ideas from your sources to support what you want to say.

If you have any doubts about the way you are using sources, talk to your instructor as soon as you can.

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