Academic Honesty

The integrity of the University community is affected by the individual choices made by each of us.  GMU has an Honor Code with clear guidelines regarding academic integrity.  Three fundamental and rather simple principles to follow at all times are that:  (1) all work submitted be your own; (2) when using the work or ideas of others, including fellow students, give full credit through accurate citations; and (3) if you are uncertain about the ground rules on a particular assignment, ask for clarification.  No grade is important enough to justify academic misconduct. 
           
Plagiarism means using the exact words, opinions, or factual information from another person without giving the person credit.  Writers give credit through accepted documentation styles, such as parenthetical citation, footnotes, or endnotes.    Paraphrased material must also be cited, using MLA or APA format.  A simple listing of books or articles is not sufficient.  Plagiarism is the equivalent of intellectual robbery and cannot be tolerated in the academic setting.  If you have any doubts about what constitutes plagiarism, please see me. 

Academic Honesty and Collaboration

As in many classes, a number of projects in this class are designed to be completed within your study group.  With collaborative work, names of all the participants should appear on the work.  Collaborative projects may be divided up so that individual group members complete portions of the whole, provided that group members take sufficient steps to ensure that the pieces conceptually fit together in the end product. 

Other projects are designed to be undertaken independently.  In the latter case, you may discuss your ideas with others and conference with peers on drafts of the work; however, it is not appropriate to give your paper to someone else to revise.  You are responsible for making certain that there is no question that the work you hand in is your own.  If only your name appears on an assignment, your professor has the right to expect that you have done the work yourself, fully and independently.