"Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal" - TS EliotPlagiarism, as defined by the Council of Writing Program Administrators, is "in an educational setting, plagiarism occurs when a writer deliberately uses someone else's language, ideas or other (unknown) originals without acknowledging the source Plagiarism is a nice word for cheating [1]Analyzing this phrase, "deliberately" and ". without recognizing the source” are the keywords that cause a lot of confusion in the art world, and especially in academia. Plagiarism is a problem because it is often too broad a term and. confusing. First, most students do not realize that they are committing plagiarism when they write. Simply because there is so much material already covered on a certain topic that it is impossible to know. if you write a sentence the same way someone else phrased it. When someone writes a paragraph verbatim using another source without properly identifying its author, they are most likely committing plagiarism and are well aware of their actions. Second, students do not cite their information correctly when they write. Either they don't know how to do it or they are completely unaware of it. Most of the time, students intentionally misquote because they feel like they can get away with it, even if they get caught. Before the Internet, students blamed their confusing “notebooks,” in which they mixed up their notes. own notes with passages recorded elsewhere. [2] In 1969, 58.3% of high school students let someone else copy their work. [3] In just 20 years, this statistic has increased from 58.3% to 97.5% of students who cheat. A national survey published in Education Week found that...... middle of paper ......y than someone else. Eventually you will have to deal with someone else's work. If you go so far as to copy several paragraphs verbatim as someone else's, then that's theft. The quote should always be used if it is more than a few sentences long. In academia, plagiarism should not be tolerated across the board, just as it is not accepted in the world of journalism. If you learn early that it's okay, you probably will for the rest of your life. In conclusion, plagiarism can be a very confusing topic because it is too broad a term and the work is not properly cited. Consequences are not enforced as forcefully in academia as in other fields. In addition, the Internet has greatly accelerated theft because it is very easy to obtain information. There are other types of plagiarism than written plagiarism; music is a good example of theft.