Education - Plagiarism Plagiarism in

Education - Plagiarism PLAGIARISM in HIGHER EDUCATION Plagiarism is one of the most common forms of academic dishonesty and has probably existed within higher education since the first time a college instructor assigned a written assignment.

It comprises several different forms, including outright copying of authoritative material without acknowledgement, presenting the written work of other students as one's own work, rewording the written material in authoritative sources or in the work of other students and presenting those ideas as one's original ideas, and various forms of improperly citing references, such as presenting ideas found in secondary sources as the product of primary source research found in secondary sources.

Plagiarism Undermines the Fundamental Value of Educational Achievements: The essential values of higher education include the retention of specific subject matter covered in courses, the learned skills of academic research, and improved writing skills. Written course assignments improve subject matter retention; therefore, failure to perform one's own written work in the manner required by qualified instructors necessarily undermines the goal of genuine learning to whatever extent written assignments are designed to facilitate those efforts.

One of the most important purposes of academic research assignments is to enable students to learn how to conduct research in conformance with commonly accepted standards of formal academic research; therefore, failure to conduct one's own legitimate research in the process of completing the assignment undermines the purpose of learning how to conduct formal research. Finally, written communication skills are more important than ever before, by virtue of the degree to which computer technology has become the standard manner of both internal and external business communications.

Likewise, writing skills are important in virtually any professional occupation; therefore, failure to perform one's one writing in completing written assignments undermines the purpose of improving one's writing skills. Plagiarism is Dishonest and Immoral: By definition, plagiarism is a form of cheating and is, therefore, immoral, in principle. More specifically, all forms of cheating are harmful to honest students in the same class because it devalues their relative performance.

In many instances, college course performance as measured by grades are incorporated into the criteria used by employers to select the best qualified applicants for employment.

Therefore, cheating is unfair to honest students who may compete for the same position as students who cheat; it is potentially harmful to prospective employers because it misrepresents the abilities and achievements of students who did not earn their grades honestly; and it is potentially harmful to the academic institution itself, because the unexpectedly poor performance of cheating graduates already in the workforce undermines the perceived value of degrees awarded by the institution and undermines the degree of respect its degrees genuinely deserve.

Furthermore, most academic institutions of higher learning maintain honor codes that must be upheld by all students as a condition of their matriculation at the institution. Academic honor codes are formal representations of the student's acceptance of the terms established by the institution governing all elements of academic and social conduct associated with the pursuit of the degrees awarded by the institution. Therefore, by definition, every form of academic dishonesty (including but not limited to plagiarism) is necessarily a fundamental violation of the institution's honor code.

Plagiarism is Unfair to Honest Students: Generally, the most common grading scheme used by college-level instructors incorporates some form of the bell curve, according to which the relative performance of all students within a given course is factored into the grading scale used to establish the specific grades corresponding to performance. The bell curve allows instructors to adjust grading to reflect the appropriateness of the difficulty of the course material as well as the instructor's ability to transmit the course material effectively.

Therefore, plagiarism (and any other form of academic dishonesty or cheating) throws of the.