Honesty and Responsibility
Academic integrity is an important tenet for HELP University (the “University”). In pursuit of the
highest standards of academic integrity, the University holds its students to the highest ethical
standards defined by the Rules and Regulations section of the Academic Handbook. All students
studying a HELP University programme are subjected to and are bound by the Student Academic
Misconduct Rule to assure academic honesty. Students are required to sign a pledge on the
assignment cover sheet before submitting your assignments.
What is Plagiarism?
Plagiarism is academic dishonesty or academic theft, and it is a serious academic offence.
Plagiarism includes, but is not limited to, the followings:
1. quote, paraphrase or summarise someone else’s ideas, theories or data, in whole or in part,
without appropriate acknowledgement;
2. borrow ideas, opinion or words, in whole or in part, from other sources without properly
crediting the author(s);
3. use any facts, statistics, diagrams or graphs, in whole or in part, without acknowledging
the source clearly;
4. claim or imply original authorship of someone else’s ideas, theories or data, in whole or in
part, as your own;
5. employ or allow someone to help to revise, amend or write your work and pass off as your
own original work;
6. collaborate with or allow other students to copy your work; and
7. draw on sources more than what you have acknowledged by citations.
While a student is not discouraged to discuss an assignment with his/her friends or classmates, the
work he/she submits must be done by the student alone. If a student shares his/her assignment with
other students and they plagiarise it, the student is as guilty as those students who plagiarised
his/her assignment. All parties to plagiarism are considered equally guilty. Under no
circumstances should a student be involved in collusion with other students unless he/she is
permitted to work on an assignment jointly by the lecturer/tutor. If a student is unsure what
constitutes plagiarism, he/she is obliged to consult the lecturer/tutor on the matter before
submission of his/her assignment.
When and How to Reference?
Knowing when and how to cite is a student’s responsibility. If he/she is in doubt or need more help
on this matter, the student may consult the lecturer/tutor. The following list comprises some of the
sources a student will need to reference. The list is by no means exhaustive, but simply consists of
the most common sources used by students to complete their work.
1. Books
2. Chapters in books
3. Journal articles
4. Conference papers
5. Newspaper articles
6. Magazines
7. Websites
8. Study guide
Students are advised to cite in the following cases[1]
:
1. When he/she quotes two or more words verbatim, or even one word if it is used in a way
that is unique to the source;
2. When he/she introduce facts that he/she have found in a source;
3. When he/she paraphrase or summarise ideas, interpretations, or conclusions that he/she
find in a source;
4. When he/she introduce information that is not common knowledge or that may be
considered common knowledge in your field, but the reader may not know it;
5. When he/she borrow the plan or structure of a larger section of a source’s argument (for
example, using a theory from a source and analysing the same three case studies that the
source uses);
6. When he/she build on another’s method found either in a source or from collaborative work
in a lab;
7. When he/she build on another’s program in writing computer code or on a not-commonlyknown algorithm; and/or
8. When he/she collaborate with others in producing knowledge.
In general, a referencing system requires two parts:
1 http://www.yale.edu/bass/writing/sources/plagiarism/warning.html, accessed May 18, 2008.
1. In-text citations
This is information about a source within the text of an assignment.
2. List of references
This is a list of all sources a student has used to research his/her assignment. It is
alphabetically arranged by author surname and appears immediately after the last page of
an assignment.
Different faculties or departments may have different requirement on how referencing for an
assignment should be done. The various formats used for in-text citations and list of references are
available in the following websites:
1. Harvard System
(http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/library/subjectsandsupport/referencemanagement/harvard))
2. Chicago Style (http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/index.html)
3. American Psychological Association or APA Style (http://www.apastyle.org)
4. Modern Language Association of America or MLA Style (http://www.mla.org/style)
Once a student has selected a referencing style for his/her assignment, he/she must follow the same
style consistently throughout the assignment. We strongly suggest that the student consults the
lecturer/tutor about which method to use before submission of his/her assignment.
Possible Penalties for Plagiarism
Possible penalties for plagiarism range from mark reduction for the assignment to expulsion from
the University. The student will not be allowed to make up the assignment. If plagiarism has been
found to have occurred, the following action(s) as determined by the forms of plagiarism
implicated:
1. Complete plagiarism
Verbatim copying another person’s work without acknowledgement
1
st offence : A grade of “F” in the subject and a warning letter will be issued
2
nd offence : Expulsion from the University
2. Substantial plagiarism
Near-verbatim copying another person’s work by simply altering the order of the sentences
or the format of presentation or by changing a few words or phrases without
acknowledgement.
1
st offence : Zero mark on the assignment and a warning letter will be issued
2
nd offence : A grade of “F” in the subject and a warning letter will be issued
3
rd offence : Expulsion from the University
3. Minimal plagiarism
Acknowledgement is made but paraphrasing by changing and/or eliminating some words
1
st offence : Deduction of 50% of available marks on the assignment and a
warning letter will be issued
2
nd offence : A grade of “F” in the subject and a warning letter will be issued
3
rd offence : Expulsion from the University
4. Unintentional plagiarism
Insufficient acknowledgement by not applying citation or quotation marks correctly
1
st offence : Deduction of up to 50% of available marks on the assignment and
a warning letter will be issued
2
nd offence : A grade of “F” in the subject and a warning letter will be issued
3
rd offence : Expulsion from the University
Pleading ignorance or unintentional plagiarism does not constitute valid reasons for plagiarism
and will not avoid the penalties from being imposed. Excuses for acts of plagiarism such as the
following, but not limited to, will not be entertained:
1. I don’t have time to do the assignment
2. I have too many assignments due on the same day
3. I don’t know, I really didn’t do it
4. I am not aware
5. I don’t understand what plagiarism means
6. I have no intention to plagiarize
7. I forgot to cite the reference
8. I forgot to include the bibliography
9. My English is not good
10. My lecturer/tutor did not explain to me
11. In my country, it is alright to copy someone else’s work
12. My friend copied my assignment when I let him/her to look at my assignment
13. My friend copied my assignment when I allow him/her to use my laptop
14. I did my assignment in the computer lab, someone must have copied my work
15. I asked my friend to submit my assignment and he/she copied my work
16. I discussed my assignment with my friends, so our answers are the same/similar
17. Even though I do not have in-text citation but I have bibliography/reference list
Students should be reminded that it is their responsibilities to take due care throughout their written
work to effectively reference or cite when they use others’ ideas from any source.