Plagiarism is one of the gravest forms of academic dishonesty in university life. Whether intended or not, it is academic fraud. In a community of scholars whose members teach, learn, and discover knowledge, plagiarism cannot be tolerated.
Plagiarism is failure to properly assign authorship to a paper, a document, an oral presentation, a musical score, and/or other materials that are not your original work. You plagiarize when, without proper attribution, you do any of the following:
copy verbatim from a book, an article or other media
download documents from the Internet
purchase documents
report from other’s oral work
paraphrase or restate someone else’s facts, analysis and/or conclusions
copy directly from a classmate or allow a classmate to copy from you
Your professors are responsible for helping you understand other people’s ideas, use resources and conscientiously acknowledge them, and develop and clarify your own thinking. You should know what constitutes good and honest scholarship, style guide preferences, and assignment formats for each of your courses. Consult your professors for help with problems related to fulfilling course assignments, including questions related to the attribution of sources.
Through reading, writing, and discussion, you will undoubtedly acquire ideas from others and exchange ideas and opinions with others, including your classmates and professors. You will be expected, and often required, to build your own work on that of other people. In so doing, you are expected to credit those sources that have contributed to the development of your ideas. You can find more information on Steinhardt's Guidelines for Academic Integrity on our website.