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Plagiarism, tradition of concern

Plagiarism defined by the Oxford English dictionary as the act of taking someone

elses work or ideas and passing them off as ones own. In Malaysian universities, plagiarism

has become an increasingly a heavy issue to be dealt with. With the issue not just taken by

the universities, but also to the Ministry of higher Education, Ministry of Education, and

international bodies alike.

The most common practice of plagiarism is done by universities students to complete

their assignments. The degree and type of plagiarism are done in a vastly different manner.

There are students who plagiarize among themselves, copying each others works and

assignments with only little differences. Some copied sections of publicized articles, journals,

and other research material without proper referencing and acknowledgement. And there are

some who hired someone else to do the assignments for them and passing it off as their own.

These plagiarism cases are becoming more common in the recent years. A researched

done by Eric Lee Chan Yu and Mathuri Subramaniam from the INTI International Collage

Subang Jaya in 2011 showed that majority of the students are unaware that they are

committing an act of plagiarism and miss defining the meaning of plagiarism. These shows

that some types of plagiarism have been accommodated as a part of the higher education

process as a method to complete their assignments or tasks. As some of the students claims

that what they do are actually just a method to get information and ideas. While there are

some who are aware that they are committing plagiarism when completing their assignments,

they would reasoned that they need to do it to get a good mark on their assignments, or

thinking that everyone done it and still get away with it.

In response to the increasingly common practice of plagiarism, the higher education

officials such as the ministries & universities have device and develop a stricter set of rules

and regulations to properly address the issue. The rules are designed to counter the problem

by properly gives out the punishment that are fitting to the level of plagiarism committed. To

make the students aware of the problem and solution, the implementation of the rules are

designed so that the officials can include programs and create devices to help the students

understands what falls under the confines of plagiarism and how to manage away from

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committing plagiarism. In most cases, these programs and devises are introduced during the

induction to the university or studied in a special course on study skills.

Even with the regulations and information given to the students, plagiarism will not

diminish easily. If the implementation of the rules are not properly executed, or the fairness

of the system in the university are in doubt, there will always be students or even personal

among the faculty member that thinks that plagiarism is a tradition that cannot be broken. The

tools are given and the instruction are clear, what is left is for everyone do their part to

counter the problem and in turn, show that we can produce a unique creative mind within

every graduate that we produce.