For Students

Citation and Documentation

Grammar

Plagiarism

To plagiarize is to “steal and pass off as one’s own the ideas, words, or writings of another.” This Webster’s Dictionary definition is quite straightforward, but it is possible for students to plagiarize inadvertently if they do not carefully distinguish between their own ideas or paper topics and those of others. The Bard faculty regards acts of plagiarism very seriously.

Listed below are guidelines to help students avoid committing plagiarism.

• All work submitted must be the author’s. Authors should be able to trace all of their sources and defend the originality of the final argument presented in the work. When taking notes, students should record full bibliographical material pertaining to the source and should record the page reference for all notes, not just quotations.
• All phrases, sentences, and excerpts that are not the author’s must be identified with quotation marks or indentation.
• Footnotes, endnotes, and parenthetical documentation (called innoting) must identify the source from which the phrases, sentences, and excerpts have been taken.
• All ideas and data that are not the author’s must also be attributed to a particular source, either in a footnote, endnote, or innote.
• Bibliographies must list all sources used in a paper. Students who have doubts as to whether they are providing adequate documentation of their sources should seek assistance from their professor or from Academic Resources before preparing a final draft of the assignment.

The penalties for plagiarism are as follows:

• Failure in the course in which plagiarism occurs.
• Denial of the degree in cases involving a Senior Project.
• Expulsion from the College for a second offense.

The  following penalties may be imposed on students who write a paper or part of a paper for another student, even if this is done during a formal tutoring session:

• Loss of all credit for that semester and suspension for the remainder of that semester.
• Expulsion for a second offense.

Any student accused of plagiarism or of writing for another’s use may request a hearing before the Faculty Executive Committee supplemented by two representatives of the Student Educational Policies Committee. The student must request this hearing within 24 hours after he or she has received written notification of the charge. The findings of this body are final. 

Students may not submit the same work, in whole or in part, for more than one course without first consulting with and receiving consent from all professors involved.

(From the Bard Student Handbook)

Study Skills

Writing

The following links have thorough and helpful information about virtually every part of the academic writing process: