Brownsville ISD

Acceptable Use Policy

(AUP) 

Brownsville Student-Parent Handbook

p. 3-4 Technology Resources and / or Internet

p. 36 Academic Dishonesty

Everyone needs to know the ins and outs of copyright laws. Young and old need to know what they are getting into.  We all need to understand where credit needs to be given.

Licensing & Software Piracy 

This is the unauthorized use or duplication of any computer software.  Programmers work hard to create licenses and programs. Once people duplicate them the programmers will not receive the revenue from these programs. A down side to pirated software is many contain damaging viruses for your computer. A person can also incur legal issues and fines.  Unless you want to get caught and face major consequences just go out and buy the program you want so their won't be any problems.

                                          Fair Use 

It is the right  to reproduce materials without permission for educational purposes.  Teachers and students must follow the guidelines provided in order to avoid lawsuits from the creators of the materials  being  used.  

Teach Act 

This allows the rights of educators to become more broad which will allow them to use more materials without any penalties.  Educators still have to show proof that they are using the materials for educational purposes only and not for personal use.

                                                     Plagiarism

Plagiarism is the stealing of another person's work or ideas and taking credit for it.  Now a days with the internet and millions of websites students tend to think they can get away with copying some else's work. Reports, research, projects are sold online so students take the easy way out and buy these materials. What they do not realize is teachers have now of programs to run their projects or papers through to see if they were bought on-line.

Web/Wiki Publishing 

People think everything on the internet if free to use. That is far from the truth.  Anything that is published on the internet had to have come from some point of origin.  People who use published materials need to either ask permission for use or give credit to the author/owner of the material being used. Yet sometimes that is not enough.  So when not sure about what to do with borrowed material it is always safe to ask for permission to use. 

FAQs 

There are always questions about how to handle copyright. Click into this link and hopefully this site will help answer any questions you might have about copyright laws and how to deal with it.