Plagiarism and Academic Integrity

The University undertakes to provide a secure, supportive yet challenging environment for teaching and learning and research supervision - an environment in which students will be stimulated to reach a high level of intellectual attainment.

The University is committed to high standards of professional conduct in all activities, and holds its commitment and responsibilities to its students as being of paramount importance. Likewise, it holds expectations about the responsibilities students have as they pursue their studies within the special environment the University offers.

Click here for more on Academic Integrity.

University Statement on Plagiarism and Academic Integrity

"Plagiarism is a form of cheating. It is taking and using someone else's thoughts, writings or inventions and representing them as your own; for example, using an author's words without putting them in quotation marks and citing the source, using an author's ideas without proper acknowledgment and citation, copying another student's work.

If you have any doubts about how to refer to the work of others in your assignments, please consult your lecturer or tutor for relevant referencing guidelines, and the academic integrity resources on the web at http://www.academicintegrity.utas.edu.au/.
The intentional copying of someone else’s work as one’s own is a serious offence punishable by penalties that may range from a fine or deduction/cancellation of marks and, in the most serious of cases, to exclusion from a unit, a course or the University. Details of penalties that can be imposed are available in the Ordinance of Student Discipline – Part 3 Academic Misconduct, see http://www.utas.edu.au/universitycouncil/legislation/ "

The University and any persons authorised by the University may submit your assessable works to a plagiarism checking service, to obtain a report on possible instances of plagiarism. Assessable works may also be included in a reference database. It is a condition of this arrangement that the original author’s permission is required before a work within the database can be viewed.

Assignment Cover Sheets

Students are required to submit a signed cover sheet with every assignment. This includes a declaration that all material submitted is their own work except where there is clear acknowledgement or reference to the work of others and that they have read the University statement on Academic Misconduct (Plagiarism) on the University website at www.utas.edu.au/plagiarism or in the Student Information Handbook.

Staff can download a blank pro-forma version of the cover sheet from here:
Cover Sheet pro-forma (MS Word 224kb)

Referencing

Student writers need to back up their ideas, or those they quote, by direct or indirect referral to and citation of the scholarly literature, works of art and inventions that they have used. Failure to do so constitutes plagiarism, a matter considered by the University of Tasmania a serious offence. Therefore, it is important that students understand how to correctly refer to the work of others, in order to avoid plagiarism.

This is done by following a method of citation (ie referencing) that is the preferred method for the discipline being studied. (Some commonly used examples of referencing methods are Harvard, APA*, Author date or foot/endnoting.)

Because of the varied background of students admitted into its courses the University accepts that students may not have developed scholarly referencing skills before beginning their university study. It is therefore the responsibility of teaching staff to provide clear, unambiguous and educationally appropriate information about preferred citation methods to commencing students. It is also the responsibility of students to learn the craft of scholarly referencing and to accurately cite the work of others in their own assignments.

The basic requirements for scholarly referencing are:

when directly quoting from another author's work, the relevant passages must be indicated by the use of quotation marks, or another acceptable method eg identation of the quoted passage;

the exact source and page numbers of the material directly quoted must be indicated by citation in the assignment text or by footnote (depending on the referencing method used);

complete bibliographic details must be provided in an alphabetical reference list attached to the back of the assignment.

An example using the author date system is offered below:

In a book titled The Prime Ministers of Australia (1990) Graham Fricke writes the following about Alfred Deakin

"He was, as his biographer has put it, the first, and probably the last prime minister of Australia to receive while in office a summons for riding a bicycle on the footpath" (La Nauze, 1965, p. 146)."

This comment relates to Alfred Deakin's unorthodox behaviour as a prime minister. Fricke came across this anecdote in his research about Deakin and wanted to use it in his own book. Fricke used his own words but attributed the information to J.A. La Nauze the original author. Fricke's list of references at the back of his book would show the following entry. La Nauze. J.A., 1965, Alfred Deakin Melbourne University Press, Melbourne.

Further examples of correct referencing can be found at the University Library website Guide to Presentation of Assignments.
For more detailed information about scholarly referencing and plagiarism students are recommended to the following sources of information

• Unit guides and outlines
• The Guide to the presentation of assignments
• Learning development workshops on scholarly referencing (refer to the Flexible Education Unit).
• Learning development on-line referencing tutorials (refer to Flexible Education Unit).
  

Concerns about referencing and plagiarism can and should be directed in the first instance to subject lecturers and tutors. Other staff available to assist students include learning skills lecturers and librarians.

* APA = American Psychological Association - a commonly used referencing style.

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Last Modified: 18-Sep-2008