Understanding Plagiarism

Kayla Good

UNV-103

August 14, 2018

Benjamin Perlin

Journal Entry: Understanding Plagiarism

Plagiarism is defined in the encyclopedia Britannica (2011) as “the act of taking the writing of another person and passing them off as one’s own.” There are different forms of plagiarism including self-plagiarism, paraphrasing, and working on assignments as a group that is an individual assignment. Self-plagiarism is using your own work that your submitted for one assignment and turning it for another assignment. You may use parts of other assignments if you cite your previous work. Paraphrasing is using ideas from others that weren’t your own. Citing the work of others is very important to make sure the original writer is getting the credit for the work they did. One must always cite their sources when using others work.

Plagiarism can be an issue for students who are overwhelmed and stressed out. They don’t think about the academic dishonesty aspect when they have a deadline or the consequences their school has for plagiarism. Students tend to turn to plagiarism as a quick fix for an assignment they might have procrastinated on. Some students don’t even know they are plagiarizing until it’s to late. With modern day technology it’s so much easier to plagiarize with the internet as a source to get the work you need. With plagiarism comes harsh consequences and some think its worth the risk.

Avoiding plagiarism is as easy as making sure you cite all your sources and turning your work in to Turnitin.com to make sure your work is not considered plagiarism. GCU offers us many resources for help like the writing center and tutoring to make sure our work is accurately done. Plagiarism is a topic that should be taken seriously as it could ruin your academic career and future career. I have learned that plagiarism isn’t a thing to take lightly and to make sure I always double check my sources. A key takeaway for me was to always make sure I turn my work into Turnitin.com and to keep my work at percentage under 10% to avoid plagiarism.

References

Plagiarism. (2011). In Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved from

 https://www.britannica.com/topic/plagiarism