IntroductionPlagiarism involves stealing and using another author's ideas, words or expressions and making it appear as if it is his or her original work. It's basically just copying, stealing and that's wrong. For example, you stay up all night and work hard on a homework assignment and your dorm mate just copies your assignment and gets a good grade or, you have good work with good ideas and someone includes your writing and your ideas in the paper without giving you any credit. Many students nowadays are very guilty of plagiarism. Students get confused about what plagiarism is and in this article I will explain what plagiarism is, the history of plagiarism, why we shouldn't do it and the consequences of plagiarism. What is plagiarism? Plagiarism is anything you take from someone else that isn't yours and use it as your own work without giving proper credit. Plagiarism is considered theft but is not the same as copyright. Stanford views “plagiarism as the use, without giving reasonable and appropriate credit or acknowledgment of the author or source, of the original work of another person, whether such work consists of code, formulas, ideas, language, research , strategies, writing or other form." (Wikipedia) It is not okay to copy something from a website, newspaper, book, magazine or any other printed source. It is not okay to copy something word for word that is the obvious way of plagiarism. No it doesn't matter how long it is, whether it's a phrase or a sentence. According to Buzzle the word "plagiarism" actually comes from the Latin word plagiarius, which means kidnapping or kidnapping. today plagiarism is very serious as a college student to understand what is and what is not... middle of paper... it can really have an effect on learning and maybe he could never do something he wanted to do because he once did the wrong thing It is always very important to make sure you do not plagiarize. Conclusion I learned a very important lesson by writing this article. I now have a good understanding of what plagiarism is and what not to do. Now I understand what's good and what's not good. I understand the rules in citing and citing articles. At the end of the day we all know that plagiarism is very wrong, but some people don't mean to do it on purpose. Some students are not taught exactly what to do when writing articles and using other sources. To save time and also your grade, it is recommended to never plagiarize. Give credit to every source you use, even if it's just a small phrase or a couple of words. The credit owed is what matters most. Great lesson learned.