Plagiarism

“The Danger of Plagiarism”Name
Date
Institution
The Danger of Plagiarism
Plagiarism is defined as “the presentation of someone else’s work as your own” (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 2015). In other words, this pertains to the act of using or stealing someone else’s idea. This serious academic offense usually happens among postgraduate students. In a survey conducted by Attwood (2008), there is about 1.9% of the student population in postgraduate and 0.67% in undergraduate are guilty of plagiarism case. This rising rate pushed some authors to regard this case as something “endemic” (Roberts, 2007) and “spreading like a flu” (Schroth, 2012). Academic institutions should adopt the stricter process of detecting plagiarism and harsher policies to students who will be found guilty to alleviate the case.
There are many factors that account to the rise of plagiarism case in many universities. One factor is the lack of apt treatment for students found guilty. There seems a direct relationship between penalties and plagiarism. Attwood (2008) mentioned that “larger universities with less selective admissions policies have higher rates of student plagiarism and apply less severe penalties than their more selective counterparts.” This research suggests that penalties for plagiarism vary according to the type of academic institution. Thus, it is important that schools adopt harsher policies to alleviate plagiarism cases. Virginia Poly…