Academic Honesty-Avoiding Plagiarism: Academic Honesty

Academic Integrity means doing the right think when no one is looking. It means upholding the academic honesty policies set forth by Southern Crescent Technical College found in the Student Handbook under Student Conduct Code: Academic

It means doing your own work even if your friend offers you help on a take-home exam. It means writing your own papers and properly citing your resources. It means taking an online quiz without the help from your textbooks or friends, if the quiz is supposed to be taken that way. Also, it could mean reporting someone you suspect has cheated on an exam or other assignment.

Why is academic integrity important?

1. Academic Integrity means others can trust you. People can rely on you to act honestly. Trust is one of the most important characteristics of successful leader. These individuals develop good reputations for fair, honest and trustworthy. Developing good ethical habits now while you are in college will benefit you as you enter the workplace and face ethical issues.

2. Academic integrity adds value to your degree Employees are looking to hire graduates who they believe have high personal integrity. They would rather invest their time in someone that will have a positive impact on their company and will carry out the mission of the company with trust and loyalty.

3. Academic integrity is important because it offers you peace of mind that you believe in doing the right thing.  Acting with integrity can reduce stress, make you happier and healthier and more productive in your life.

Source: Bauer College of Business https://www.bauer.uh.edu/current/academic-honesty.php

Most college students know that plagiarism—deliberately submitting something you did not write—is a violation of academic honesty with serious consequences. Not all realize, however, that other forms of academic dishonesty are also unacceptable. These include:

• Double-submitting, or using the same work to meet assignments in two or more courses;
• Insufficient paraphrasing, or representing someone else’s language too closely as your own;
• Pirating ideas, or using the thoughts, concepts, and analysis of someone else—even those of a friend or roommate in casual conversation—as your own;
• Incomplete citation, or failing to include all necessary elements of documentation in your citations (for example, omitting either in-text citations or a Works Cited pages when both are required);
• Under-documentation, or combining several sources into a single one.
• If you have any doubts about whether you are engaging in academic dishonesty, the best approach is to show a draft to your professor and discuss how you are documenting your sources. Do not simply take the word of a fellow student, who may unintentionally be giving you bad advice

Source: Colby College