Feedback - Assignment 1 - Referencing and plagiarism

The second posting on Assignment 1 feedback:

 ** REFERENCING

Despite the warnings provided in the "Additional Information on the Assessment" section in the Unit Specification Booklet and noted at the top of the Assignment One page, some students were submitting assignments with either no references or just the textbook and study guide. This is insufficient at university level study and results in many lost marks.

As a student your role is to prove that you have a solid grasp of the topics being assessed, this means that more than my comments in the study guide and detail from the textbook is required. The readings must also be used. In other words, research and considered thinking is required - one measure of this is the number of references used.

I am sure that when you received the study package you all groaned about its size and number of readings, I know, because I too use to be a distance ed student. However the reason I provide so many is because we have plenty of students working in isolated areas without access to brick and mortar libraries, the web and even in some case email. Thus I have done much of the research for you.

PLEASE make use of the readings, they should be your first resource BEFORE you look elsewhere like on the web. Another useful resource is the online journal databases that can be found on the UTAS Library website, as one of your colleagues told me recently, "it is pure gold".

** PLAGIARISM

Plagiarism was an issue on too many papers, more specifically it was indirect plagiarism where information and ideas from elsewhere were paraphrased without the reference. Hence, some of you may have found the comment "How do you know this?", in other words, I recognised this information from the reading resources and thus it should be referenced.

I will be much harder on plagiarism in Assignment 2 and the Exam. Last year two students automatically failed a subject in the Department due to the extent of plagiarism (no, not from my subjects). Please help make my job easier by not plagiarising. OK, I know that was a self-interest reason, but at least you also don't lose marks.

Please note that providing a reference at the end of a paragraph DOES NOT mean that the paragraph has been covered. In general, a reference only refers to the detail in that particular sentence. If you do not understand plagiarism, please contact me - the sooner the better, let's get this sorted out before assignment 2.

Cheers

Stephen