On Friday afternoon, April 13, Reporter was informed by RIT SportsZone that the article “RIT SportsZone: Rising to the Top” contained information that had been taken verbatim from its website and from the RIT University News article “‘RIT SportsZone’ Recognized at 2012 College Television Awards.”

Upon review, we determined that an alarming amount of content was taken from these two sources, as well as from the College Television Awards website, without attribution. In addition, the author misspelled the name of RIT SportsZone Producer and Director Kevin Roche and mistakenly affiliated SportsZone with the Department of Communications instead of ETC Video Production.

In response, Reporter called an emergency editorial board meeting. We investigated the writer’s entire body of work, as well as the past three issues in their entirety, in an effort to ensure that there were no other instances of plagiarism in our recent publications. We discovered that one of the writer’s other articles, “A Woman’s Guide to Manscaping” (Vol. 61, Issue 22), also contained plagiarized content .

Reporter does not tolerate plagiarism. Our purpose as a news publication is to present the truth, and there are few things more dishonest than attempting to pass off the work of another as your own. As a result, we met with the writer, explained what we had discovered, and terminated her employment with Reporter. The editors responsible for both articles have agreed to step down voluntarily as soon as we have selected replacements.

Reporter has an editorial process designed to prevent transgressions like this from occurring. Once an article is submitted, it is reviewed by a section editor, who passes it along to the managing editor, copy editor and editor in chief. These editors check it for accuracy and objectivity before approving it for print. In addition, writers are required to list the sources they use in their articles to prevent plagiarism and aid editors in the fact checking process.

The break down that this system encountered last week was an embarrassment and an indelible mark on the magazine’s credibility and integrity. We apologize to RIT SportsZone and University News for the unattributed use of their material, and to our readers for the factual errors that made it into the article. We apologize for allowing this breach of journalistic professionalism to take place. In response to the plagiarism contained in the two articles, we are officially retracting “RIT SportsZone: Rising to the Top” and “A Woman’s Guide to Manscaping.”

Reporter’s editorial board will undergo more rigorous training to ensure that they are aware of their roles in the magazine. We will be reviewing our editorial policy regarding fact checking and attribution. We will be having professional journalists speak to our staff on the matters of ethics and purpose. We are also looking to acquire commercial anti-plagiarism software such as Turnitin.

We deeply regret and assume full responsibility for this error. We understand that this represents a violation of trust between Reporter and its readers, and we will take every opportunity to rebuild that trust and ensure that these events are not repeated.