Plagiarism Policy

Plagiarism, as defined by the Oxford dictionary is “the practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as one's own.” It is a serious academic offence for which there are serious consequences.

It is acceptable to use and reference others’ code however it is an academic plagiarism offence if any piece of work which is not entirely the students own is not correctly referenced or acknowledged. All student projects submitted will be reviewed for plagiarism. This includes checking code comparison tools, plagiarism software, review of git commit history and other mechanisms.

It is the responsibility of each student to ensure that any direct or indirect inclusion of the work of others is fully and adequately acknowledged. We appreciate that plagiarism may be unintentional however it will still be treated as an offence. If in doubt, include attribution of all sources, or ask your Hackathon mentor for advice.

Students are encouraged to ask Hackathon mentors or their peers for advice about their project work, but any submission should not include any code written by others unless it is explicitly credited to them. Failure to correctly credit code that a student hasn’t created themselves will be considered plagiarism and will result in a failing grade. Blatant or repeat offences of plagiarism will not be tolerated and will result in stringent penalties being applied, including removal from the course.