Ethical Use of Information

Right or wrong?

A person in your gym class fails to close his or her locker properly? You help yourself to their scientific
calculator because you can’t afford one and they were stupid enough not to lock their locker.

Right or wrong?

You find a pair of bomber sweats in the weight room. Someone took yours last year, so you take this
pair. Now you’re even.

Right or wrong?

You get an essay back from a teacher and you’ve got a good mark. Someone in the class who hasn’t
done theirs yet to asks you for it. You let them have it because you don’t want to look like a geek, and
anyway, you’re not the one who is cheating.

Stealing is wrong

Whether you take an object, an idea or someone’s work.

Plagiarism is theft

 Plagiarism is using the ideas and writing of the others and representing them as your own.
Taking the work, skills and ideas of another person and pretending them your own is intellectual
theft. It is wrong
 Fortunately there are ways of doing research that will allow you to avoid committing plagiarism.

Why do people plagiarize?

 Not knowing any better

 Pressure / Competition
 Lacks of confidence
 Work perceived as too hard
 Lack of consequences
 Boredom/ lack of interest / laziness
 Arrogance
 Avoiding plagiarism

 Taking good notes and keeping track of your resources will help you avoid plagiarism.
 Here are three ways to use the information you find while you’re researching :

 Summarizing
 Paraphasing
 Quoting directly

Data vs. Information

Data Information

Meaning Data is raw, unorganized When data is processed,

facts that need to be organized, structured or
processed. Data can be presented in a given
something simple and context so as to make it
seemingly random and useful, it is called
useless until it is information.
organized.
Example Each student's test score The average score of a
is one piece of data. class or of the entire
school is information that
can be derived from the
given data.