Plagiarism Policy

This policy should be read in the context of the Ofqual documents on Plagiarism to be found at http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20131202173050/http://www2.ofqual.gov.uk/files/2009-12-24-plagiarism-students.pdf.

Plagiarism is an offence. Where assessors have reasonable evidence that a student is using material that is garnered from other sources without acknowledging those sources, they are entitled to refuse to give a Pass mark for that assignment, even if the material in itself meets the criteria for a Pass.

In the first case of plagiarism, the student should be given guidance about how to distinguish between the proper use of research and the wholesale copying of material from other sources. This is often problematic for some students. Where the student ignores or refuses this advice, then the student is clearly in breach of Online Learning College requirements. They should be warned of the consequences of repeated breaches.

In the case of a student ignoring the advice to give references for raw material used in an assignment on more than three occasions in the same course and/or when they do not use the material for their own reflections, the assessor has a right to fail the student for the whole course, irrespective of whether the student has reached the last assignment or not.

All students are referred to the Ofqual guidance on Plagiarism in their Study Guide, and the student should be alerted to this when the assessor first detects the practice.

Should a student object to being failed for Plagiarism, they are entitled to appeal through the Appeals procedure. In this case it is important that assessors provide evidence for the judgement they have reached.

Plagiarism Statement

This is passing off someone else’s work whether intentionally or unintentionally as your own for your own benefit or advantage, and may result in you being unable to complete your qualification and forfeiting all fees as it may be considered fraudulent. 

Whilst you are enrolled with Online Learning College, it is expected that you will:

  • Only hand in your own work for assessment
  • Clearly show when you have used information provided by someone else by giving the person’s name and where you found the information in the references/bibliography
  • Enclosing the quote within inverted commas
  • Show where you have downloaded information from the internet and give the name of the site from where the information is taken