Part Two: Course Completion

Plagiarism and Academic Misconduct

Students enrolled in an Athabasca University course such as HSRV 477: Project Implementation I are expected to adhere rigorously to principles of intellectual integrity.

Plagiarism is a form of intellectual dishonesty in which another person's work is presented as one's own. Be certain that whenever you use a secondary source in your course work and assignments you reference your source in a consistent and logical manner. All direct quotes (quotations of any number of words from the original) and indirect quotes (paraphrased ideas) must be acknowledged. Failure to do so constitutes plagiarism and, as with other forms of academic misconduct, will be penalized. Penalties may take the form of rejection of the submitted work; expulsion from the examination, the course, or the program; or legal action, depending on the specific nature of the infraction.

Dutiful citation of quotes and paraphrased material does not mean you can produce satisfactory written work by stringing together a series of quotations. You should always try to summarize or describe someone else's ideas in your own words. If you present your own ideas or opinions in a paper, provide substantiated evidence or arguments for your position.

Note carefully:

It is plagiarism when you use another person's ideas and fail to indicate the source of the ideas. It is plagiarism when you use another person's words and fail to put these words in quotation marks even if you provide a citation. A citation indicates the source of ideas; only quotation marks clearly indicate that the words are someone else's, not your own.

All assignments must be original work for this course. The use of assignments from previous courses or from other students is considered a form of cheating and will be subject to discipline for academic misconduct. Where a project in the directed readings course takes previous course work as its starting point, the learning contract should reflect the shared expectation of the student and directed readings supervisor about how this material is to be used.

For more information on this important matter, you may wish to contact Athabasca University to obtain a brochure about intellectual honesty. This material can be ordered by phone: 1-800-788-9041 (ext. 6286); or by email: services@athabascau.ca. This information is also available on Athabasca University's web page. From our home page, www.athabascau.ca, click on "Student Services."