Nik is in trouble for assignment plagiarism.
- Rule #1 – Don’t copy your assignments.
- Rule #2 – If you do copy, admit it. Punishment will be less severe.
Hi i was just reading the post about the assistantship screw ups… well im in troubled waters myself.
My friend and I were discussing and writing an assignment together and we both had almost the same wordings.
Now the professor is saying we have committed plagiarism.
Well I dont know wht’s going to hppn now as the prof said he needed to speak to the Program Head. This has never hppd b4 to me! ne idea wht wd happen? ne one been in a similar condition as I have?
really worried now.. i dnt want 2 b sent home!
It was jst an assignment! n we did it together as we wd generally do in India! Any advice would def help
Thanks!
What is Plagiarism and Why is it Important?
In college courses, you are continually engaged with other people’s when reading them in texts, hearing them in lecture, discuss them in class, and incorporate them into our own writing.
As a result, it is very important that we give credit where it is due. Plagiarism is using others’ ideas and words without clearly acknowledging the source of that information.
How Can Students Avoid Plagiarism?
To avoid plagiarism, you must give credit whenever you use
- another person’s idea, opinion, or theory;
- any facts, statistics, graphs, drawings—any pieces of information—that are not common knowledge;
- quotations of another person’s actual spoken or written words; or
- paraphrase of another person’s spoken or written words.
Trouble
You should have similar rules (like above) in your university.
Coming to US for higher education is one thing, but why do you want to spend so much money and travel several thousands of miles to copy assignment or do same things that you did in India?
Expressing same ideas will end up in different words and sentences atleast in writing assignment. But, having almost same words, will not fit well with professors.
Your professor and department head have to decide what can be done.
All you can do is admit the truth (if you copied) or say you both discussed the ideas, but was not aware of giving credit.
Hope for the best.
Lessons
Its not just writing assignment. Professors take assignments, projects seriously.
If you plan to copy, think several times before doing it. Get ready to face severe consequences.
If you have faced similar situations, do share your experiences.
I faced something similar too, in this case, a fellow student used my assignment without my knowledge. I had to meet with the professor multiple times, to convince him that I knew nothing about it. Luckily for me, the other student confessed that I didn’t know he had used it. For first time offenders, you usually get a zero in the assignment, which is bad in itself as it might count seriously towards your grade. For repeaters, things can get worse from fail grade to expulsion. Its better to get lower marks than go into all this trouble.
Since you copied fro your fiend, the universitiy officials will give you both a zero for that test. That will pull your overall GPA down. You need to put more effort in your remaining exams so as to get grade B atleast in that course
It was jst an assignment! n we did it together as we wd generally do in India!
Portrays wring attitude right away. You must acknowledge that even if you do it in India, it is still wrong. Accept your mistake and be prepared for the the consequences. There is no other way out of this. Hope they understand your case.
It happened to me when I was doing my Master’s. Actually it happened twice. First time myself and one of my friend copied from each other and submitted the assignment. Professor was not satisfied and took this matter very seriously. we told him that we both live together and are good friends that is why we shared our ideas and we were unaware of this American Plagiarism rule. He gave both of us a final warning not to repeat it again.It happened second time with the different professor and we told him that we worked hard together on this assignment. As a punishment he gave ‘O’ in the assignment i mean no credit.So buddy just chill don’t think too far.You will not be kicked out as your thinking it is not easy to do that as they also know you came from very far.Either you may get zero or a last warning thats it… nothing more than that. Make sure you and your friend should give same statements always. They sometimes call both of you individually and try to dig it out the fact by taking your side like “tell the truth we will forgive you and will take action against your friend”. In that case you will screwed if you don’t play smart.Just say you both shared your ideas and worked together regardless not knowing the rules of American Plagiarism and now we learned from our mistakes thats all..Stick to one statement do not change it..Good Luck..You guys will rock..
Yeah, and moreover if they didn’t talk about plagiarism during the orientation and it was your first time and did it unintended, they shouldn’t be as severe. As of my university, we has a twenty minutes talk about plagiarism and it’s consequences during our orientation seminar, so if something like that happens here, we can’t be like “Awe, I’m sorry I didn’t know about it”.. nope, won’t work.. So, be truthful and explain what happened, and DON’T repeat it.. we were told that in most cases of plagiarism, students don’t realize while doing it and end up being expelled.
I think this is a case of collusion means your words are similar to your classmate. Do as HSB has siad, admit that you guys were discussing the assignments and thats how it has lead to this mistake. Assure them that you did not know that the words would be same and try to convince your professor. This is not hard core plagiarism and I think they will understand your case, as it was mistake.