So i’m a freshman in high school and i got suspended ( FOR ONLY 1 DAY ) for plagiarizing on my english paper. This is my first offense ever, and i plan for it to be my last. I was pressed for time on this poetry essay i had to write so i went to a website and used 4-6 sentences from the website, and then changed up the word use and structure a bit, but still got caught. Those 4-6 sentences accounted for only ½ of ONE of my body paragraphs (3 body paragraphs in total). I know what i did was wrong and i regret it immensely, but i only plagiarized about ⅛ of the entire paper, which was only 2 ½ pages. Will this look bad on my college application? my biggest choices are Vanderbilt and UCLA.
Depends, speak to your guidance counselor about how this is handled. If it is reported to colleges, yes, it could affect your chances. You have an opportunity to explain that you made a mistake and will never do it again on the common app if you wish. If it’s not reported to colleges, obviously you’re fine.
PS - If you do have to explain your mistake, don’t make excuses like you’re doing now. Plagiarism is plagiarism. Whether it’s 1 line or a 20 page paper. You could get kicked out of college for this mistake.
My D was suspended a few times. She still got in many colleges including university of Chicago.
Luckily, you’re a freshman in highschool. That means if you handle it well and there’s not any offense following it you should be fine.
I think you should be able to explain this away more or less, since you’re a freshman, but anything like it–even the smallest hint of academic dishonesty–in the future will be very bad and potentially calamitous for your chances at selective schools like the ones you mention above.
This shouldn’t derail your future plans, but it does give you a guide about how careful you should be in the future. Sounds like you are not very good at this kind of rewriting so you should stay clear from doing it in the future. In college, profs often use Turnitin.
I actually was caught for plagiarism during my junior year. Let me start by saying that you’re not a bad person for having plagiarized. If anything, use it as a wake-up call to improve your time management skills. Be thankful that your offense had no repercussions. When it comes time to apply to college, please ask your disciplinarian whether or not you need to bring up the offense. When I asked mine, I learned that I didn’t have to mention it to anyone which really helped me out since I had been prepared to previously. Just please, please learn from your mistakes. I can honestly say that I learned from mine.
For the record, I’ve been accepted everywhere I’ve heard back from so far, including reaches. This incident will not affect your admission chances. Best of luck! PM me if you have any more questions.
Your first – and most important – step is to stop making excuses and offering rationalizations. Carefully re-read your initial post to this thread; it is replete with such garbage. You cheated and were detected, those are the ONLY relevant facts, and that’s ALL that matters . . . not the length of your suspension, nor the fact that it was the first time you were caught, nor that you were time constrained, nor that the plagiarized portion of the paper was small. Until you stop attempting to justify this academic dishonesty, your apologies and contrition understandably seem entirely duplicitous.
Many college applications – including, I believe, the Common App (?) – REQUIRE all instances of academic fraud to be reported. In addition, many GC’s recommendations (and some transcripts) also REQUIRE that such illicit conduct be noted. If this is true for you (and it may well be), obviously outstanding schools including Notre Dame and Vanderbilt will be quite concerned with your cheating. This does NOT mean you will axiomatically be rejected, but it does mean that you – and your GC – must explain what happened, that it altered your values and your life, that there has been no repetition of such conduct, and that you’ve clearly learned from this error.
We all make mistakes. Frankly, however, your excuses, justifications, and rationalizations are more troubling to me than your cheating, per se!
The OP said she regretted it deeply and has learned to never try it again.I think she was explaining the situation rather than justifying it. In any case, she knows enough now to foresee the real consequences the incident could have if it is highlighted by her GC. Hopefully she will grow and learn from the transgression.
I think that most colleges are pretty forgiving toward mistakes committed in freshman year, but a repeat incident would send off serious alarms. Perhaps you should consider yourself lucky that you were caught early in your academic career, and so you know that teachers can and will look for plagiarism of this nature. It probably seems unfair that other kids are doing the same thing all the time, and getting away with it, but some of them will also eventually get caught. The schools you are interested in are very competitive and rigorous. If you struggle with your high school work load and time demands, you probably should set your sights a little lower. There’s no shame in that. Not all of us are cut out for high-pressure environments. If you feel you need to cheat to keep up, you should probably reassess your objectives.
Hey guys, I am kind of nervous about my chances of getting into an Ivy League. I’m an incoming junior and I have a 3.9 GPA, president of my school’s Microfinance Club, have some awards in MUN and am an officer of my school’s MUN club, and got a 2250 on the SAT. I’m planning to retake the SAT this fall and hopefully get 2350, and next year im taking 4 APs and self studying some. However, throughout both my freshman and sophomore years I was a bit immature and pranked a bunch of people, like smashing ping pong balls at people and some more serious, physical offenses. I’ve racked up 2 suspensions so far. However, I talked to my schools vice principal who said that, if I improve next year and mature, he will not tell colleges about my suspensions.
I was just wondering, are my suspensions really bad? I made some mistakes, which I got warnings for, but in sophomore year I really crossed the line and thus ended up with 2 suspensions (One of them I pushed a guy who pranked called my mom- I was really pissed at him) and another was the ping pong incident. I don’t think they are big mistakes and I have never cheated on any test so far. Do you think I have a shot at getting into an Ivy League with my suspensions? Also, I heard that on the Common App I have to say whether I get suspended or not. However, Harvard accepts both the Common App and the Universal College application. So does the UCA ask about suspensions?
^ Start your own thread.