What Plagiarism Is and Tips on How to Elude It

What Plagiarism Is and Tips on How to Elude It Religiously Adhering To The Guidelines: How To Elude Copying In Essay So lets talk about plagiarism, the ‘killer disease that is ailing the better percentage of students’ population and making things worse, the students are not even aware of it. Universities and other educational institutions abhor plagiarism as it is not only slipping its way into students academic lives, but the students are not mindful of it. Often than not, we have received concerns and queries from people requesting that we clear some issues for them. What is plagiarism? Why is it wrong? How do I know I am copying some elses work? How can I remedy it? Luckily for you, this is our area of specialty, and we hold every answer to any question you might have. We have dissected this jargon ‘plagiarism and explain every aspect relating to it ranging from its definition and characterization to the dos and donts. Lets get dicing! Plagiarism, what does it comprise? To be able to put things into more perspective, let us begin with the definition of plagiarism. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, it defines plagiarism as the act of deliberately presenting someone elses work as your own without giving them credit. Note that the definition strongly inclines towards stating the fact that plagiarism involves ‘cheating. University writing prohibits in any account should you copy an assignment from a friend, from the internet or any other study material. It is wise to first start by reviewing what is acceptable and what is not according to the university writing standards. The first outlawed behavior is copying, buying or having someone do an assignment for you. Without saying, this is wrong and I can bet when you are presenting the task to your instructor, your heart beats faster than usual as the fear of getting caught becomes imminent. This statement is not to say that you should not ask for a friends help and opinions or google some answers on the internet, but that you should write your thoughts and not those you have copied from different sources. Moving on swiftly, a fact that is elusive to many students yet frequently practiced is self-plagiarism. Tendering in an essay, dissertation or any other work you had done and submitted for another subject in another class is an offense that can land you in trouble. The most significant attributes that a university can pride itself in is quality education where students get grades that they deserve. Plagiarism puts this objective into jeopardy as it erodes the uprightness and reliability of the universitys education system. As a student, you should endeavor to avoid plagiarism as it is not only cheating, it gives you this false impression that you are performing well when in reality you might be not. It is imperative to know by heart and follow the laid set of guidelines by the university. You might be wondering why you should heed to this advice? The number of things that can go wrong if your secret gets out in the open is frightening. Let us begin with what could go wrong when you are caught cheating before guiding you on how you can evade this menace. Many universities have a protocol on the steps to follow in disciplining a student caught cheating. At the outset, the instructor checks your work and possibly as many universities now do, the instructor passes your paper through plagiarism checker applications such as Turnitin and so on. On the realization that your article does not comprise of your original work, the instructor calls you into his/her office, interrogates you after which they either award you a zero or pass on your case to the dean of students. If the situation is too complicated for the deans office, you can be called in by the principal and who wants to be called in by the principal for not so good reasons? Ignorance is no defense, always remember this as you do your assignments. The number one excuse that most students give when caught is that they were not aware they were committing a writing offense, a clichà © that needs to stop. You must know and apply the guidelines provided by the university to avoid getting yourself in such situations. Again, get conversant with your schools rules. Do not get me wrong, I am not trying to instill fear in or frighten you but open your eyes to the reality of the matter and exactly the fate you will share like many other unfortunate students have. To help you wrap your head around this issue, below is a selection of the most popular questions we get and our professional responses. Citations Unlike high school writing, university level is more demanding of quality, good writing techniques, and evidence to support your claims. In many instances, your professor or course instructor will instruct you to use peer-reviewed journal articles or research papers. The problem comes in when you use other peoples thoughts, opinions or suggestions without referencing or giving them, credit and it culminates to plagiarism. Therefore, it is important to cite every information you outsource. The essence of citations Citing is important because it indicates that you have conducted vast research on your paper and you took your time in preparing it. Instructors and professors award grades to students according to their judgment of the amount of effort, your knowledge and proficiency in a particular topic. When you reference your work, this demonstrates to the examiner that you did put in work, and therefore, you are deserving of a good grade. When and where to insert citations Ideally, you are expected to cite sources that were useful and helped you put together your paper. However, too much citation becomes plagiarism in itself as throughout the paper you will air and express the opinions and thoughts of other people. Popular phrases and expressions commonly used do not necessitate referencing. A decent paper that meets the standard requirements has minimal citations to maintain originality. How to differentiate between popular knowledge and personal thoughts To differentiate between the two, common knowledge are truths that everybody knows and do not need to refer to countercheck the information. For example, Barack Obama was the 44th president of the United States of America is common knowledge known to everyone and it calls for no referencing. Personal thoughts are opinions specific to an individual which you get either from a book, research paper, bibliographies and so on. How to cite other peoples work There are some citing approaches available to writers, and they include APA (American Psychological Association), MLA (Modern Language Association) to mention but a few. These styles have unique characteristics features exclusive to each style with some being complex while others simple to understand. Hence, it is mandatory to first acquaint yourself with the style the paper requires. If you are not certain, make a point of seeking clarification from your professor or instructor. Thanks to technology, you can access these referencing styles off of the internet, download and print them for future use. Now you know the different types of citation formats, but how do you insert the sources into your work? There are two main ways to go about this; you can either paraphrase or quote the words, phrases or sentences you have borrowed. Paraphrasing is restructuring the borrowed material and putting it across using your own words. On the other hand, quoting is lifting the material and inserting into your paper precisely the same way without changing anything, use quotation marks. Prudence should be employed when writing short notes with the probable cause of using in future assignments to avoid plagiarizing the words as you cannot find the exact paragraph or page number you derived it from the material you read. As mentioned earlier, different referencing styles demand varied formats for citing sources, especially for lengthy quotes. For example, in APA the following form should be adhered to, indention of  ½ inch from the left margin and end the phrase with a colon. Make sure you read the instructions of the paper before beginning the writing process. Rewording is the process of restating some elses speech without changing or distorting the meaning. Nevertheless, you must cite the sentences you have paraphrased lest it will be ruled out as copying. If you are citing a long phrase, the citation will look something like this; authors last name (Beckham), the year the source was published (2016) or the page you got it from (p.11). The disclaimer here is that, despite the fact you reworded the phrase, a reference is needed to dodge copying accusations. Characteristics of good works cited page or footnotes The golden tenet is all the sources used in the in-text citations should appear in the reference page, works cited, bibliography, etc. depending on the formatting technique of the paper. Sources not used in the paper should never appear on the works cited page. Those sources will be stricken out as irrelevant. Use the proper layout to arrange the sources, i.e., begin with the authors surname, year, the name of the article then the name of the journal. Ask for assistance There is no shame in asking nor receiving help with your assignment. Ensure you do the assignment yourself before seeking help. Some people have raised concerns arguing that taking the paper to editors is also cheating. They insist on the later as the editors in an attempt to perfect your paper, will make changes to it, and in the end, little close none of your initial work will be traceable. Varied institutions have differing reservations. Various universities will allow you to consult a professional and even make changes to your paper as long as you come open about it and indicate on top of the article. Simultaneously, other institutions strongly forbid it as it stating it is foul play. Translation software should be a no-go zone for you as it is plagiarizing your work. The structure, meanings and meaning are altered. Aside from this, there is omission and distortion during the translation process from your mother tongue to English. The effectiveness of such software is still under contention. Is it alright to request assistance when I get stuck in my assignment? Asking for help with your homework is acceptable, and no one can fault for that. However, you would want to be careful with whom you ask for advice. Decease from consulting your friends most especially if they happen to be your classmates. Sharing ideas and possibly writing the papers together culminates into cheating as you will both present a similar flow of thoughts. The best and safe source of help will be your professor or subject instructor. An instructor will offer you shallow insight with reasonable cause. You can seek the help of professional writers who will guide you on basic rules to writing a good paper. Alternatively, you could use a prototype essay to compare and contrast with your paper. The use of a prototype does not imply that you will be plagiarizing but is it like a guiding torch, where you can draw ideas, the dos and donts and so on. Do not fall prey to the unmonitored and non-appraised content that has flooded the internet. Keenly choose reliable and peer-reviewed essays as your source to avoid being misled by low-quality papers. Tutoriage is an ideal site for finding credible standard articles. Customer satisfaction through quality papers is our primary objective, and we pride ourselves in our team of capable professionals and proficient writers. Our team of writers hails from internationally accredited universities, the likes of Oxford and Cambridge. We encourage division and specialization of labor where every writer skillfully writes on the topics he/she is most talented. This move guarantees that eminently quality papers for our clients. Our articles are specifically tailored to suit the needs of our clients with 100% ingenuity. Having a team of qualified writers like us at your corner will make your writing experience at the university not only pleasurable but insightful as well. Students are constantly encouraged to learn to work by themselves when doing their assignments. The reality however is, many students require additional assistance with their assignments and instructors can barely find time due to their busy schedules. An external trainer, like ourselves, might cost you a few more bucks but in the end, it is worth the while. We sharpen your reading and writing skills, an attribute you need to have in the competitive job market. In brief†¦ The university has your best interest at heart, and their insistence that you avoid plagiarism is not meant to make your life miserable. Aside from educating you to become an upright member of society, they are training you to value and appreciate the significance of being truthful and sincere. To learn to acknowledge the effort and input of other people and award them the befitting recognition they so deserve.