What is plagiarism:
According to BC's policy on Academic Integrity "Plagiarism is the act of taking the words, ideas, data,
illustrations, or statements of another person or source, and presenting
them as one's own. Each student is responsible for learning and using
proper methods of paraphrasing and footnoting, quotation, and other
forms of citation, to ensure that the original author, speaker,
illustrator, or source of the material used is clearly acknowledged." Refer to BC's comprehensive Academic Integrity Policy.
Avoiding plagiarism:
Take excellent notes. Plagiarism often stems from sloppy
research and subsequent rewriting rather than a deliberate desire to
cheat. Nevertheless, even unintentional failure to cite sources
correctly and honestly may constitute plagiarism. Many students
mistakenly take bad notes during the research process. They write
someone else’s text verbatim on a card or on their computer and forget
quotation marks. When they write the paper and refer to their notes,
they forget the text on the card or computer is another author’s and not
their own. Any reader who recognizes the original text believes that
the student has cheated. This can lead to tough penalties.
