Student Guidance on the Avoidance of Plagiarism, and the University’s Procedures for Dealing with Plagiarism Cases in Taught Undergraduate and Postgraduate Programmes

 

Definition

Students must ensure that any work submitted for assessment is their own. Plagiarism is the act of copying or including in one's own work, without adequate acknowledgement, intentionally or unintentionally, the work of another, for one's own benefit.

Thus, the following are examples of plagiarism:

1. Including in one’s own work extracts from another person’s work without the use of quotation marks and the acknowledgement of the source (which may be a book, a research paper, a web source, another student’s work, a lecturer’s comments or class notes etc.).
2. Summarising another person’s work without acknowledgement.
3. Using the ideas of another person without acknowledgement of the source.
4. Copying the work of another student, with or without their knowledge or agreement.
5. Cutting and pasting from electronic sources without explicit acknowledgement of the URL / author, and without explicitly marking the pasted text in inverted commas. The inclusion of large amounts of such pasted material, even if acknowledged, always raises doubts about how much of the work presented should be credited to the student. The same applies to over-quotation from a traditional, printed source.

 

Avoiding plagiarism

 

Plagiarism is academically fraudulent, and is viewed by the University as a serious disciplinary offence. It may be intentional or unintentional: the innocent misuse of material without proper acknowledgement can still constitute plagiarism whether or not deliberate intent to cheat is involved.

 

Students can avoid plagiarism by ensuring that any sources used in submitted work (other than examination scripts)[1] are adequately acknowledged and properly referenced, and that appropriate standards for academic practice in the relevant subject area are always adhered to. This will include:

 

1.      providing full citation of all sources (books, articles, websites, newspapers, images, artefacts, data sources etc.) used in the preparation of a piece of work.

2.      properly referencing the sources of the arguments and ideas used in an assignment using the recognised reference system for the subject area. Both quotations and paraphrased versions of arguments or ideas should be referenced in this way.

3.      following other guidelines for preparing and presenting coursework as provided by the subject area.

 

It should be noted that referencing and citation practices will vary from one subject area to another. Students undertaking outside courses should therefore take particular care to ensure that they are familiar with the appropriate practices for the subject in question.

 

Particular difficulties may also be encountered when undertaking assessed group-work, and guidance should be sought from the group-work supervisor if this is not provided by default.

 

Additional information on appropriate academic practice within particular subject areas and when reporting on group-work will be provided by programme directors and course organisers.

 

There is, in all subject areas, a certain body of long-established information which is described as “common knowledge” and does not need to be referenced.  It can be difficult for a student to be sure what is and what is not common knowledge, but that understanding is a part of the essence of the subject area. Further guidance on this difficult area will be provided by programme directors and course organisers.

 

Finally, students should take care when discussing their work and sharing ideas with other students: students assisting someone else in plagiarising (for example, by lending them an essay or other piece of assessed work) may also be in breach of the Code of Student Discipline.

 

University procedures for dealing with suspected cases of plagiarism

 

Suspected plagiarism at any stage of a student’s course, whether discovered before or after graduation, is investigated and dealt with appropriately by the University.

 

Should a marker suspect plagiarism, the following procedure is followed:

 

1.      The marker informs the relevant Course Organiser (for undergraduate programmes) or Programme Director (for postgraduate programmes), who considers whether or not the case is minor. Minor cases are always first offences, and include:

a.       innocent misuse or inadequate citation of material.

b.      over-reliance on sources, with insufficient work that is the student’s own.

c.       cases in which the plagiarism affects only a small proportion of the piece of work.

d.      cases in which the piece of work in question makes only a very small contribution to the overall mark for the course.

2.      Minor cases are handled by the Course Organiser/Programme Director: he or she interviews the student concerned to obtain information about the suspected plagiarism and any special circumstances. Following the investigation, the student receives a written warning, and advice on avoiding plagiarism in the future. The case is noted on the student’s personal file, held either by the Director of Studies in the case of an undergraduate student, or the Programme Director in the case of a postgraduate student. This ensures that repeat offences at a later stage in a student’s programme are recognised as such.

3.      Cases which are not considered to be minor are investigated by the Convener of the Board of Examiners. The student is interviewed by the Convener and another member of the Board of Examiners, who decide whether the case is ‘significant’ or ‘not significant’.

4.      ‘Significant’ cases are repeat offences, or those which involve extensive plagiarism. Cases classified as ‘not significant’ involve innocent transgressions of the rules, or mitigating, special circumstances.

5.      If a case is classified as not significant, the student in question will receive a warning and advice on the avoidance of plagiarism from the Convener of the Board of Examiners. As with a minor case, the matter will be noted on the student’s personal file, held either by the Director of Studies or the Programme Director.If the case is classified as significant, it will be considered by the entire Board of Examiners. One of two possible courses of action will be taken, depending on the severity of the case:

a.       the student will receive a warning and advice on the avoidance of plagiarism in the future, and the matter will be noted on both the student’s personal file and their College Office record. However, no further action will be taken, but it should be noted that the mark given will reflect the academic quality of the work.”

b.      the Board of Examiners will agree on the significance of the case, and will reduce the student’s mark accordingly (potentially to zero, with whatever consequences would normally follow from such performance, including loss of class or failure in the case of honours examinations, or failure in the case of other examinations); the student will receive a warning and advice on avoiding plagiarism in the future; and the matter will be noted on the student’s personal file. In addition, it will be reported to the College Office which will take appropriate steps under the Code of Discipline. This may include referring the matter the University Discipline Committee, which has the power to award a fail mark in some or all of a student’s assessed work, to temporarily suspend a student from the University, or to expel a student from the University.

 

Full details of the University’s policy on and procedures for dealing with plagiarism can be found within the 2003 Assessment Regulations: http://www.aaps.ed.ac.uk/regulations/exam.htm

 

 

(Plagiarism resources produced by Oxford Brookes University http://www.brookes.ac.uk/services/ocsd/4_resource/plagiarism.html

and the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC)

http://www.jisc.ac.uk/index.cfm?name=issue_plagiarism

have been used substantially in the preparation of this document.)