Academic Honesty

Academic honesty: “any behavior or act that implies intent to make someone believe what is not true, as by giving a false appearance.” (1).

Academic honesty is an easy enough concept to understand, but it is seldom regarded as it should be. A major issue surrounding this idea is the fact that many students simply disregard it. Many spend too much time doing other things to brainstorm and create their own ideas, so they take from others, just to get by. Others simply feel they don’t have the talent or intelligence to write a competent paper, so they ‘borrow’ as well.
It is in these situations that the line of academic honesty and integrity is crossed; when a student provides ideas and information under the pretense that these are their own, when in all actuality, they are someone else’s. Unfortunately, once a student resorts to these tactics, at least until they’re caught, they rarely use their own work. Some go as far as to share this ‘cool shortcut’ for writing papers with their friends, and thus the academic integrity of a large portion of the student body may be jeopardized.
‘So how is this problem remedied? Many teachers have begun cracking down on these acts of plagiarism. They have developed many simple ways to check to see if a student’s work is their own. So how do you get away with it? DON’T DO IT. Many students have more talent than they give themselves credit for, and should they develop a better work ethic, could write a paper worthy of a passing grade. If you do choose to use information or ideas from others, quote the original authors in some form of bibliography.
1.http://www.callutheran.edu/Academic_Resources/CTL/Students/AcademicHonesty.htm
2. http://www.whittier.edu/academic/AcademicHonesty_policy.pdf
3. http://www.marquette.edu/wac/plagiarism/AvoidingPlagiarism2.shtml
4. http://www.laspositascollege.edu/facultystaff/honesty.php
5. http://cc.ysu.edu/~helorime/AcademicHonesty.html