The FASS is committed to fighting plagiarism and adopts the position as set out below:

1. No student shall represent the work of another person as his/her own in any academic assignment, thesis or project even if the material so represented constitutes only a part of the work submitted.

2. No student shall copy ideas found on the Web without giving proper credit to the original sources.

3. No student shall download or copy, in part or in their entirety, articles or research papers found on the Internet and submit the paper as his/her own work.

4. No student shall contribute any work to another student if he/she knows or should know that the latter may submit the work in part or whole as his/her own.

5. Receipt of payment in whatever form for work contributed shall raise a presumption that the student had such knowledge.

6. Any student found to have committed or aided and abetted the offence of plagiarism may be subject to the following penalties depending on the severity of his involvement in the offence.




1. The student shall be treated as having committed a disciplinary offence under the penalty guidelines of the National University of Singapore;

2. The student shall fail the subject, course or programme of study, with or without any marks given for that subject, course or programme of study; and

3. The student shall be treated as having committed a disciplinary offence under section 1 of Statute 12 (Penalty) of the National University of Singapore.

7. Students should seek clarification from their respective tutors, lecturers or supervisors if they are unsure whether they are plagiarising the work of another person.

Borrowing extensively from one's own work, produced for a different module, is also a form of plagiarism.

1. In their written assignments, students should not reproduce extensive portions (10% or more) from written assignments completed for another module(s).
2. A student who reproduces extensive portions from a previous assignment in another assignment is guilty of academic dishonesty because he/she is claiming additional credit for work which has already been done.
3. Students who wish to work in a topic which is closely related to a written assignment completed for another module should first highlight this to the lecturer concerned and produce a photocopy of the previously completed assignment for the lecturer in order to ensure that the new assignment is not a re-use of the previous work.

A student may not knowingly intend to plagiarise, but that should not be used as an excuse for committing it. Students are encouraged to consult the following link on how to avoid plagiarism: http://www.cdtl.nus.edu.sg/cdtlhome/special.htm#Plagiarism

Borrowing extensively from one’s own previous work or assignment is also a form of plagiarism.

Click here for a compulsory quiz for FASS students from 2008 cohort.