Definitions
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is commonly defined as using the words or ideas of another person or source without proper acknowledgment. This includes taking credit for materials from any print or electronic source, whether or not that material has been previously published or copyrighted.
Plagiarism is applied not only to extensive borrowing of words or phrases that are not attributed to the original source, but also to ideas found in another’s work, even if the ideas are reworded by the student or by AI, unless they fall into the category of common knowledge.
To summarize, students need to submit their own work, and any verbatim reproduction of the work of another, no matter how brief, must be explicitly documented, as well as any summary or paraphrase of the ideas of another, unless they are common knowledge.
Common knowledge
Information that a great majority of people know or can find from a number of sources.
Other Academic Dishonesty
In addition to plagiarism, the academic community consider several other kinds of behavior as academic dishonesty. Since the evaluation of student work results in a formal grade legally recorded on a student’s transcript, any work offered in support of that grade which demonstrates plagiarism or academic dishonesty as listed below is an attempt at fraud and will be dealt with accordingly.
These include:
- Turning in an assignment (test, paper, presentation, project, discussion post) that was created wholly or in part by another person or entity without prior approval (for example, turning in a paper purchased online)
- Turning in an assignment (test, paper, presentation, project, discussion post) created wholly or in part for another course for which academic credit was received, without so specifying.
- Submitting another’s answers on a test or other assessment.
- Using AI tools to write papers or responses beyond their use for limited editing unless otherwise specified by instructor.
- Otherwise violating the NLU student conduct policies.