How to avoid cheating in Computer Science
(note this page was inspired by material at the
University of Toronto.)
What is plagiarism?
Passing off someone else's work or ideas as your
own. In computer science this usually means submitting someone else's code
as your own.
Consequences
At Lisgar a mark of zero will be given to assignments
that contain plagiarized work. The assignment must be redone or make-up
assignment may assigned for no marks. If this happens on a summative assignment,
it could easily lead to a failure.
Helping vs. Cheating
It is important to learn from your peers. Sharing
ideas in class, helping each other get unstuck, is an important part of
your class work and will count towards your teamwork evaluation. The idea
has to be to help each other learn and understand rather than "give someone
the answer". If someone gets a high mark on an assignment and a low mark
on the related test, it is clear that the person hasn't done the assignment
on their own, and will do poorly on tests, exams and future assignments.
You are often hurting your friends by letting them see your work, rather
than helping them understand the assignment.
How to avoid cheating
-
Never share a soft copy of any assignment, whether
by e-mail or diskette.
-
Never print out an assignment to share with classmates.
-
While you can let your classmates look at your
screen, do not let them copy what is on the screen
-
Make sure your classmates fully understand any
code you are helping them with.
Detecting plagiarism
It is not difficult for your teachers
to detect plagiarism. When you submit code that acts or looks the same
as a classmate's code you will be suspected. Code written independently
looks very different, just like two English essays, or two pieces of Art
work.
If your caught
It is important you learn now what plagiarism
is. At the university level getting zero is just the beginning. At
worse, you can be expelled for cheating, a serious offense will go
on your permanent record. Not a pleasant thing to discuss at job interview.
Creelman
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