Plagiarism
Thinking about doing a little cut and paste from this web site to
produce a term paper or other assignment? Please, think again.
This site is monitored by
www.turnitin.com, an anti-plagiarism site. From what we
can tell from our log records, about half of the various Bible
studies (and practically nothing from the topical studies) has been
used as a source of plagiarism. The only people I can think of
who would want to do that are Bible College Students.
Come on, you of all people should know better.
If you are in doubt what plagiarism means in an academic setting,
you might take a look at
http://www.accreditedschoolsonline.org/resources/preventing-plagiarism/ .
There are no doubt other resources (hint: your college has a
policy) which may be more relevant to you, but this site puts the
matter clearly.
Myth: "everything on the
Internet is in the public domain." Myth busted
here. (Hat tip to Marilyn
Nolan and her student Lisa at North Mountain Institute) .
We can't stop you from plagiarizing the web site; indeed, for
the typical Bible school teacher we encourage it. These
lessons are put out there to be used - but not to be presented as
your own work. Ethically, that's just plain wrong. It
also deprives you of the experience of learning. There's also
a good chance now that you'll get caught at it, too.
You may be thinking, "Hey, you have no idea how difficult it is to
write these papers." It's hard? You're having difficulty
with it? Then get some help! See if your college has a
campus writing center - many do, just to help students in your
situation. If you prefer, you can hire a writing coach or
editor. Your writing center may have a referral list. I
personally recommend
Semper Editing - an excellent editor and writing coach who is
also a solid Christian. (Full disclosure - she's the real
writer in our family.)
Also - take a look at Maryville University's
plagiarism page. which includes a link to their
online students research toolkit - good stuff!
