Janet Harron

A webpage designed to help Memorial students avoid the pitfalls of plagiarism is now available atwww.mun.ca/writingcentre/plagiarism/.

The result of a Senate sub-committee on plagiarism under the auspices of the Senate Committee of Undergraduate Students (SCUGS), the content of the website was designed and approved by a pan-university committee consisting of Charlene Walsh (Marine Institute), Prof. Donna Walsh (Department of English), Amber Haighway (MUNSU), Lorna Adcock  (QEII Library), Dr. Alex Marland (Department of Political Science) and Ginny Ryan of the Faculty of Arts’ Writing Centre.

"We wanted to create something helpful and instructive that could be used by students and faculty alike, so that everyone would have a shared understanding of the forms that plagiarism can take along with ways to avoid it,” explained Ms. Ryan. “Much of the plagiarism that occurs in student papers stems from lack of awareness of the things that constitute plagiarism, rather than from academic dishonesty. This website was designed to increase pan-university awareness of the care required in using other people's words and ideas."

The webpage gives concrete examples of the most prevalent forms of plagiarism, along with commentary and examples of ways to correct them. These include not citing at all, using other people’s work word for word without quotation marks, inadequate paraphrasing and not including citations properly. The webpage also includes a series of frequently asked questions.