Academic Integrity

Introduction

Although most students are honest, there are issues with academic integrity that emerge during the course of the semester. The following article outlines Rutgers’ Interim Academic Integrity Policy and provides a few resources and ideas for helping your students to understand the university’s expectations and the norms for academic honesty.

Rutgers Policy on Academic Integrity

Rutgers Interim Policy on Academic Integrity and can be found on the Student Judicial Affairs website:

Academic integrity is essential to the success of the educational enterprise and breaches of academic integrity constitute serious offenses against the academic community. Every member of that community bears a responsibility for ensuring that the highest standards of academic integrity are upheld. Only through a genuine partnership among students, faculty, staff, and administrators will the University be able to maintain the necessary commitment to academic integrity.

[section omitted regarding the administration’s responsibility]

The faculty shares the responsibility for educating students about the importance and principles of academic integrity.

Individual faculty members are also responsible for informing students of the particular expectations regarding academic integrity within individual courses, including permissible limits of student collaboration and, where relevant, acceptable citation format. Finally all students of the faculty should report all violations of academic integrity they encounter.

Many faculty and TAs add sections of this policy to their syllabus at the beginning of the semester which is a practice that the University encourages. Equally important, it is always useful and instructive to outline your expectations on every assignment that you give to your students regarding citations, resources, working independently and how you expect the work to be completed and submitted. The more specific you are, the less the likelihood of mistakes or problems that arise after the fact. Although lack of knowledge of this policy is never an excuse for cheating, it is always appropriate to remind your students of certain elements of the policy in anticipation of final projects and final exams. Do not assume your students understand the policy fully or that someone else has explained the elements of the policy to them. Students do have responsibilities outlined in the Rutgers policy:

Students are responsible for understanding the principles of academic integrity fully and abiding by then in all their work at the University. Students are also encouraged to report alleged violations of academic integrity to the faculty member teaching the course in which the violation is alleged to have occurred.

A guide for instructors is available from the Office of Student Judicial Affairs here.

What, then, exactly constitutes violations? The next section, while not all-inclusive, outlines many of the kinds of violations found in the policy.

Academic Integrity Violations

There are many kinds of violations that can occur: cheating, fabrication, plagiarism, denying others’ access to information or material, and facilitating violations of academic integrity. All quotes in this section are from the Rutgers Academic Integrity Policy.

Cheating is defined in the Rutgers Academic Integrity policy as “the use of impermissible and/or unacknowledged materials, information, or study aids in any academic activity. Using books, notes, calculators, conversations with others, etc. when their use is restricted or forbidden constitutes cheating.” In addition, “students may not request others (including commercial term paper companies) to conduct research or prepare any work for them. Students may not submit identical work, or portions thereof, for credit or honors more than once without prior approval of the instructor to whom the work is being submitted for the second or subsequent time.”

Fabrication is the “falsification or invention of any information or citation in an academic work.” This “‘invented’ information may not be used in any laboratory report or other academic work without authorization from the instructor.” The policy gives the following examples of fabrication:

It is improper…to analyze one sample in an experiment and ‘invent’ data based on that single experiment for several more required analyses.

Students must…acknowledge the actual source from which cited information was obtained. A student should not, for example, reproduce a quotation from a book review and claim that the quotation was obtained from the book itself.

The university’s policy on Plagiarism bears quoting in full:

Plagiarism is the representation of the words of ideas of anther as one’s own in any academic work. To avoid plagiarism, every direct quotation must be identified by quotation marks, or by appropriate indentation, and must be cited properly according to the accepted format for the particular discipline. Acknowledgment is also required when material from any source is paraphrased or summarized in whole or in part in one's own words. To acknowledge a paraphrase properly, one might state: to paraphrase Plato's comment... and conclude with a footnote or appropriate citation to identify the exact reference. A footnote acknowledging only a directly quoted statement does not suffice to notify the reader of any preceding or succeeding paraphrased material. Information that is common knowledge, such as names of leaders of prominent nations, basic scientific laws, etc, need not be cited; however, the sources of all facts or information obtained in reading or research that are not common knowledge among students in the course must be acknowledged. In addition to materials specifically cited in the text, other materials that contribute to one's general understanding of the subject may be acknowledged in the bibliography.

Sometimes, plagiarism can be a subtle issue. Students should be encouraged to discuss any questions about what constitutes plagiarism with the faculty member teaching the course.

Denying others access to information or material as a violation of academic integrity involves “deny[ing] others access to scholarly resources or…deliberately imped[ing] the progress of another student or scholar.” Examples include “giving other students false or misleading information; making library material unavailable to others by stealing or defacing books or journals; deliberately misplacing or destroying reserve materials; and altering someone else’s computer files.”

Finally, it is a violation of the academic integrity policy to “aid others in violating” the policies explored within: “A student who knowingly or negligently facilitates a violation of academic integrity is as culpable as the student who receives the impermissible aid, even if the former student does not benefit from the violation.”

For fuller explanation of examples, please consult the Judicial Affairs website and the Interim Academic Integrity Policy directly.

Academic Integrity Issues

If you suspect a student has violated any part of the policy, you should bring the matter to the attention of your faculty supervisor (if you are a TA). If you are the main instructor of the course, then contact an Academic Integrity Facilitator who will review the case with you and help you determine the nature and severity of the issue. Names and contact information for facilitators can be found here.

You (or your faculty member) and the facilitator will decide which level of violation the behavior constitutes (level one is typically a more minor infraction that will mean the student fails the original assignment while a level four infraction is a very serious one that requires expulsion from the university). Explanations and descriptions of the levels of violations can be found here.

Resources for Academic Integrity in the Classroom

The University Hearing Board provides an Academic Integrity Presentation that can be given to your class. Board members, who are students themselves, will present the policy and answer your students’ questions. If you are interested, contact the Office of Student Judicial Affairs. The office also hosts a website with a variety of resources for instructors regarding academic integrity.

The Office of Student Judicial Affairs also suggest the following tips to help cut down on issues in the classroom (taken from Academic Integrity: A Guide for Faculty and Staff):

• Explain plagiarism. Review Internet source use and any rules or practices specific to your discipline. [see this month’s other TAPTalk article about preparing for future courses]
• Be explicit!
  • Give explicit instruction about materials and aids that can and cannot be used (e.g. programmable calculators, electronic organizers, cell phones, iPods, laptops).
  • Give clear instruction about citations, collaboration and multiple submissions.
• Use multiple versions of the same exam and change exams each year.
• Use proctors in exams. Use multiple proctors for classes with more than 40 students and instruct proctors on responsibilities and procedures.
• Check student IDs prior to exams. We have had ‘ringers’ take exams.
• Change paper topics from semester to semester.
• When assigning papers, require that students submit outlines and rough drafts in addition to final papers.

It may also be helpful to outline a specific policy regarding the submission of work. Neil F. Williams recommends adding the following policy to either your syllabus or the assignment sheet itself:

“When you turn a paper in late, place it in the professor’s mailbox accompanied by a note from you indicating the exact time and date the paper was turned it. The time and date must also be validated with the signature of appropriate university personnel” (2007:5).

Williams believes this policy makes it clear that “there is no question or doubt about the time and day the paper was turned in; the student has a witness and so does the professor. Student formally acknowledges the work was late and therefore accepts any penalties the professor might assess per the course syllabus” (2007: 5).

While you may want to pass out a copy of the Academic Integrity Policy itself, the language can be difficult for your students. Some instructors include specifics in simpler language on the assignment sheet or exam while others make a version of it (with specific examples) to pass out to their students.

This example of a handout has been generously provided by Audrey Devine Eller, Political Science, a CASTL fellow.

If you have questions or comments for TAPTalk, feel free to contact us. Special thanks to Audrey Devine Eller.

Bibliography and Resources

Office of Student Judicial Affairs. “Academic Integrity: A Guide for Faculty and Staff.” No Date. Rutgers University. Accessed 17 March 2009.< /p>

Office of Student Judicial Affairs. “Academic Integrity at Rutgers: Interim Academic Integrity Policy.” 2 September 2008. Rutgers University. Accessed 17 March 2009.

Williams, Neil F. 2007. “The Rules of Engagement: Socializing College Students for the New Century.” The National Teaching & Learning Forum. 17 (1): 4-6.

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