Plagiarism: Home

Why should I care about plagiarism?

The FPU Handbook makes academic integrity a priority at the university, including strict rules against plagiarism. You can view the description of Academic Integrity in the Academic Policies section of the handbook. Consequences of violating the university's policies of Academic Integrity can range from minor to severe. Really, the easiest thing to do is to learn how to cite your work early on so you don't have to worry.

Besides the “it’s the rule” argument, consider how you might feel if someone passed your work off as their own. You might think you don’t care so much while you’re in university but consider how you’d feel out in the “real world” if someone took work you did to your boss and claimed it was their own. You’d probably be pretty angry. You worked really hard on it, after all. It probably represents a lot of time, energy, and maybe even money to you (this is also probably true of your work during university as well).

Policies against plagiarism are put in place to honor, value, and protect the work that an individual does.

So how do I avoid plagiarizing?

Always cite your resources!

Content that requires a citation:

• Direct quotations
  • Using someone else's words exactly as they appear in a resource is a direct quotation. It should always appear in quotation marks so it is discernible from the rest of your paper as someone else's words. It should also have a properly-formatted citation attached to it.
• Paraphrasing
  • Rephrasing someone's point in your own words is called paraphrasing. Usually this happens when you are trying to condense a portion of the resource slightly by stating some of it in a simpler way. A paraphrased section of text must be accompanied by a properly-formatted citation.
• Summarizing
  • Usually far more brief than the original resource, summaries typically pull only the main points of a resource and put them into your own words. Summarizing usually tries to briefly explain a large portion or entire portion of a resource (the difference between this and paraphrasing is the amount you are trying to condense). Summaries need to be accompanied by a properly-formatted citation.

Just not quite sure if it's plagiarism or not?

Ask your instructor, FPU's Academic Support Center, or a librarian. When in doubt, always cite it! It's better to be citing than sorry.

The Academic Support Center has created a really excellent document defining plagiarism and how to avoid it.

• A Fair(y) Use Tale

Simultaneously brilliant and annoying, this video is a crash course in copyright and fair use.

• Purdue OWL

The Purdue OWL keeps their information on citation styles up-to-date and is a great open access resource.