When writing study papers, you have:
- know the requirements for preparing study papers;
- select appropriate sources of information;
- use sources properly, cite them, and compile bibliographies;
- to prepare study papers in accordance with the provisions of academic ethics.
Methodological guidelines for students
All study works prepared during the studies must be prepared according to methodological guidelines. Methodical guidelines for study papers by faculties or study programs: Methodological guidelines.
Methodological guidelines for study programs for the preparation of final theses are prepared in Lithuanian.
Other publications with methodological guidelines can be found in the Virtual Library.
Search and selection of information sources
You will find reliable and appropriate information for studies and research in special information search engines, subscribed and open-access databases, virtual libraries. See: RESOURCES.
Use reliable information, appropriate sources for study and science. Sources of information must be reviewed and evaluated by specialists in the field, or obtained from official institutions, organizations, associations.
You can use: scientific articles, monographs, dissertations, scientific studies, scientific reports, legal acts, documents of institutions, statistical information, standards, patents, encyclopedias, manuals, dictionaries, etc.
Do not use: Wikipedia, science publications, media, information portals, fiction and popular literature, student work, undocumented sources.
Use the latest sources. Scientific articles should be published within the last five years. Use at least several species and language sources. It should be remembered to use not only books but also scientific articles, standards, legal acts, statistical information, and other Lithuanian and foreign languages published sources.
Citation and bibliography
Sources of information must be used in accordance with academic ethics and copyright provisions and citation rules. In order to properly prepare study papers and avoid plagiarism, it is necessary to write them independently and analyze (research) the topic or problem of the work, properly quote and paraphrase sources, indicate them in the text and bibliography.
Sources need to be analyzed, systematized, summarized, and texts should be written in a scientific style. For these purposes, various scientific language phrases can be used, which you will find in the library’s leaflet or in the compilation of academic phrases prepared by VU. When quoting and paraphrasing sources, it is necessary to distinguish the thoughts of scientists from your own comments.
Information from sources can be used in several ways:
- Citation – repeat exactly any words of the author or work. May contain sentence, multi-sentence, or paragraph-sized citations. All citations must be written in quotation marks.
- Paraphrasing – conveying basic information from sources in your own words and in your own style, but without distorting the substance. In paraphrasing, it is necessary to distinguish the thoughts of another author from your own comments, for this purpose various phrases can be used: From the point of view of the scientist…, As states… and others.
All used sources must be indicated:
- in the text – in parentheses – the author(s) and year of publication of the reference you are citing.
- in the bibliography (references list). E-sources are described according to the rules of the description, it is not possible to write only the Internet address. At the end of the e-source description, it is necessary to specify the date and access.
Bibliographic descriptions in the study papers of Kauno kolegija Higher Education Institution must be compiled in accordance with the international rules of APA. Many bibliographic descriptions are automatically available in the Virtual Library, Scholar Google, and databases.