How could committing this offense affect your professional life?

Plagiarism occurs when a writer uses the words or ideas of someone else without crediting the person who originally presented the ideas. This can be done both intentionally and unintentionally, and it is something that is taken very seriously by the university, so students must recognize and avoid committing unintentional acts of plagiarism.

Some tips to help prevent unintentional plagiarism include the following:

• When quoting an exact phrase, sentence, or short passage, quotation marks must be used.
• In addition to quotation marks, parenthetical in-text citations must be included any time information from a source is used. This includes summarizing, paraphrasing, and using direct quotes.
• At the minimum, the author’s last name and date of publication must be included in the text of the essay when the source is paraphrased, summarized, or quoted. If this information is not available, the title of the article or name of the organization must be included.
• For every in-text citation that you have, you must have a corresponding reference entry on your reference page. You do not need to cite sources on your reference page that are not cited in your essay.

For this discussion, consider the effects/consequences of committing plagiarism.

• How could committing this offense affect your professional life?
• What do you think are some of the main reasons why students plagiarize?
• What types of penalties do you think are appropriate for intentional and unintentional plagiarism?