Plagiarism is an act of theft committed by a writer who is stealing someone else’s words or ideas. Plagiarism is an act of dishonesty. Whether intentionally or unintentionally, a writer is misrepresenting someone else's words or ideas as his or her own.

• Intentional plagiarism exists when a student lists sources that he or she has not used; when a student copies from a source but fails to cite it, thereby misrepresenting the original source's ideas as his or her own; when a student copies material from another student's work without giving that other student credit; when a student buys or borrows a whole paper or portions of a paper from another student or from the World Wide Web; when a student copies another artist's music or work of art and tries to submit it as his or her own.

• Unintentional plagiarism, which is also punishable, may exist when a student attempts to paraphrase or summarize a source but copies too much from the source instead of re-writing the ideas in his or her own words; when a student inadvertently fails to include a parenthetical reference to a source, although the source is listed among the citations at the end of the paper; when a student fails to put quotation marks around quoted material; when a student relies too heavily on external sources, thus expressing few or none of his or her own ideas.

At the discretion of the instructor, a student who plagiarizes, whether intentionally or unintentionally, may experience any of the following consequences:

• The student will fail the assignment.
• The student will be required to rewrite the assignment.
• The student will fail the course.
• The student will be reported to the Vice President, Student Services/Research, for disciplinary action.

If the student is reported to the Vice President, Student Services/Research, for disciplinary action, the Vice President will review the report and begin formal disciplinary actions according to the College's policies on student misconduct.