Capital Offense?

Last week in class, we learned about a little thing called plagiarism.  While I have always had some idea of what plagiarism is, I guess I never knew how others felt about it.  When I think of plagiarism, the first thing that comes to my mind is accidentally using someone else’s work without properly citing it.  While this is true, there are some that are much more skeptical about the “accidental” part of it.  We were asked to read an article called “Plagiarism-The Capital Offense of College”.  Maybe my mind works differently than others, but my first thought was “really”? Of all of the offenses that take place on college campuses, I would hardly rank plagiarism as one of the most significant and much less one that would require capital punishment. Don’t get me wrong, I’m certainly not discounting the fact that plagiarism is wrong. However, it really comes down to the intent. Whether the student do it intentionally or unintentionally is really what matters.  If a student intentionally plagiarizes and gets caught, the grade for the paper should be a zero.  If the student made a simple mistake (as we all have), a lower grade should be given to the student along with correspondence telling that student how he/ she plagiarized.  What do you think?