What follows is important guidance on plagiarism for all graduate students in the Department of Politics and International Studies.
Plagiarism is presenting as your own work words and thoughts that are not your own. It is a form of cheating and treated as such by the University’s ordinances. If you are in any doubt about what constitutes plagiarism, ask your graduate supervisor or Director of Studies to talk you through the issue. You should also ensure that you are familiar with the University’s formal Statement on Plagiarism.
The Consequences of Plagiarism
A supervisor or examiner with concerns about potential plagiarism in work for formal assessment, whether or not the work has yet been submitted, will contact the Chair or Senior Examiner, who will liaise with the University Proctors. This will lead to an investigative meeting with the student. If the Proctor believes that there is a case to answer, s/he will then inform the University Advocate who can take the student before the University’s Court of Discipline. The Court of Discipline has the power to deprive any student found guilty of plagiarism of membership of the University, and to strip them of any degrees awarded by it. A case may be made irrespective of the student’s intent to deceive.
Use of originality checking software
The University subscribes to a service named ‘Turnitin’ that provides an electronic means of checking student work against a very large database of material from the internet, published sources and other student essays. This service also helps to protect the work submitted by students from future plagiarism and thereby maintains the integrity of any qualifications you are awarded by the University.
All work submitted as part of the formal assessment of graduate courses in the Department will be submitted to Turnitin. The originality report will then be used to inform judgements about whether or not plagiarism has occurred. The copyright of the material remains entirely with the author, and no personal data will be uploaded with the work.