SETON HALL UNIVERSITY ENGLISH DEPARTMENT CHEATING AND PLAGIARISM POLICY
CHEATING means the giving, receiving, taking or purchasing of any information or written work not your own during exams or on any written assignments.
PLAGIARISM means copying the ideas and/or language of any source without acknowledging that source, without proper quotation of any language (even single words or short phrases) taken directly from that source, and without citation of all paraphrased as well as quoted ideas from that source. Plagiarism occurs when anyone attempts to present the published or unpublished work (ideas and/or language) of any person as his or her own.
PENALTIES: Those found to be guilty of cheating or plagiarism the first time will receive a 0 (zero) for the assignment; the second time, automatic failure for the course; the third time, recommendation to the dean for expulsion.
PROCEDURE professors will follow when they have found any evidence of CHEATING among students on written assignments:
written work. The borrower will receive a 0 (zero) on the assignment, but the committee will determine whether the lender is a deliberate cheater who knowingly gave his or her work to be copied, a misguided or confused student who (albeit wrongly) gave his or her paper to a friend without realizing that it would be copied, or a totally innocent student whose paper was taken without his or her knowledge. In the first case, the lender will also receive a 0 (zero) on the assignment. Penalties in the second and third class will be decided by the professors.
TIPS to avoid any involvement in cheating:
PROCEDURE professors will follow when they find any evidence of PLAGIARISM of published sources on any written assignments:
TIPS for students who wish to avoid unintentional plagiarism:
ACKNOWLEDGE: Any ideas, facts, or language taken from a source must be acknowledged. We acknowledge the work of others by providing a "Works Cited" list (bibliography) and by citing (providing author's name and relevant page numbers) all paraphrased ideas and quoted language. The English Department requires usage of the MLA methodology of parenthetical citation on all written work. If you are unfamiliar with this, see the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers in the bookstore or library, consult you grammar handbook, or ask your professor.
QUOTE: Any language taken from your original source, even key words or short phrases, must be within quotation marks and quoted accurately. Reorganizing a sentence, substituting a synonym, or altering a word or two does not make it your own work.
PARAPHRASE: Paraphrasing means summarizing the source in your own words. Remember: paraphrased ideas must still be acknowledged! Good paraphrasing requires: 1) reading carefully enough to thoroughly digest ideas; 2) being careful not to paraphrase during the note-taking stage (i.e. take notes in direct quotes and paraphrase in the draft stage); 3) not writing with the source in front of you; 4) proofreading carefully to be sure no language from the source has slipped in unintentionally.