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Faculty, students and administrators must value honesty and want to encourage and develop it among their peers and throughout their college and social communities. In an academic community placing a premium on intellectual and moral integrity, students and faculty will take equal responsibility for bringing to light any incidents that violate the shared trust. Students and faculty will avoid allowing or actively participating in acts that violate the community trust (examples: faculty will investigate suspicious documentation; students will refuse requests to cooperate with cheating and plagiarism). So that we may all agree about what behaviors honesty includes, the following contexts are provided as examples.
- Honesty on examinations, tests and quizzes: The student who values integrity
- will prepare for and perform on all exams, tests and quizzes according to the professor’s directions and will consult the professor on any matters on which he or she is unsure;
- will perform on examinations, tests and quizzes using his or her knowledge and information and based on his or her own research and study efforts;
- will use during an exam only those aids that the instructor has specified and approved;
- will refuse to use crib notes, electronic devices including text messaging or instant messaging, have a substitute take an exam, give or receive unauthorized information prior to or during an exam, or alter answer sheets during test reviews.
- Honesty by actions: The student who values integrity
- will respectfully and punctually use public material (e.g., tapes, records, disks, books from the library or an academic department or the Consortium) that needs to be available and in usable condition for other students;
- will not make an unauthorized copy of restricted material without permission (e.g., hard copies, videotapes, software);
- will not provide work or materials for another student to copy and submit as his or her own.
- Honesty of student academic records: The student who values integrity
- will not alter or tamper with student records (e.g., transcripts, grade sheets, financial statements, references, etc.) which are the property of the College;
- will not alter or tamper with grades and assessments maintained by faculty in their records.
- Honesty on written, oral, computer, artistic, and scientific assignments: The student who values integrity
- will document all distinctive language, concepts, data, ideas, statistics, symbols, formulas, graphs, designs, and the like borrowed from published, printed, spoken, or broadcast sources whether these sources are public or private, copyrighted or uncopyrighted. Failure to document written/spoken/visual/symbolic communication, style or material is plagiarism – representing the words and/or images and/or symbols, style, and content of another as one’s own;
- will document his or her research meticulously according to acceptable standards and the professor’s prescribed format; will consult the professor or an appropriate resource (e.g., the Writing Center) on any indefinite matter. (The diligent student may and should consult any legitimate resource when doing a project, such as the Writing Center, about refining his or her writing or speaking style and about ethically using others’ material as part of that project.)
- will not substitute words/images/symbols from another’s work as one’s own and will not rearrange syntax of another’s written document as one’s own sentence structure;
- will not represent the visual or verbal organization of another’s work as one’s own;
- will compose an individual project, or his or her segment of a group project, wholly on his or her own and will not use any deceitful behavior whereby the work of another is represented as his or her own. These deceitful behaviors include ghost-written work, inappropriate collaboration, the use of an assignment for more than one class without the instructor’s permission, the submission of photocopies of others’ work as one’s own.
- Honesty in the use of computer databases and files: The student who values integrity
- will generate his or her own material and will refuse to copy other students’ disk files, databases and other electronically stored material;
- will properly cite and document all information derived from such reference sources as information retrieval services, computer bulletin boards, or CD ROM reference materials.
Students have a responsibility to comprehend and practice the honest academic behaviors that are stated and implied in this document without exception and to consult an appropriate professional resource in any case about which they are uncertain or unclear.
Students have rights when their professors question the integrity of a project. Included are the rights to:
- receive a full explanation of the problem when a professor doubts the honesty of a written, spoken, performed, illustrated, or computerized project.
- enjoy confidentiality during all stages of an inquiry into the integrity of a project he/she has done.
- challenge any decision in which the documentable evidence indicates dishonest behavior on an academic project (the process that students should follow is indicated in the College’s policy on academic dispute resolution).
- be involved in deciding the form of penalty they will receive and the restitution they will make when an evident case of academic dishonesty is demonstrated (see “Restitution and Education”).
Procedures for Restitution & Discipline
Rationale. The purpose of any process of restitution and education of an offender of an academic honesty policy is two-fold: 1) to make good for any loss which the offender has caused; 2) to help the offender learn the appropriate behavior as an alternative to the offense which he/she committed. It is assumed that for every violation of academic honesty some kind of restitution or education of the student will be applied. It is further assumed that the instructor has the ultimate authority to deal with a case of academic dishonesty in his/her course.
Procedures. When an instructor has reason to believe that the academic honesty policy has been violated, the following steps will be followed.
Step 1:The instructor will confer with the involved student(s) concerning the issue of honesty in a particular situation and determine what action needs to be taken.
Step 2: The methods available to the instructor in collaboration with the student to resolve the issue are as follows:
- The instructor require that the work be redone and/or that reasonable restitution be made (see "Restitution and Education" below).
- The student receives a failing grade for the assignment.
- The student receives a failing grade for the course, without the option of dropping the course if the deadline has not yet passed. The instructor should inform the registrar and his/her department chairperson if this option is chosen.
- The instructor, with the knowledge of the department chairperson, recommends one of the following to the vice president for academic affairs (VPAA):
- that the student be dismissed from the program
- that the student be suspended from the College
- that the student be dismissed from the College.
Academic honesty should not be indicated on the student’s official record as reason for failing a course, suspension or dismissal. The student involved in the issue of academic honesty has the right to appeal any decision regarding academic honesty through academic appeal process.
Restitution and Education. After an instructor has determined that a violation of academic honesty has occurred, the instructor will decide on an appropriate action of restitution and education. In deciding this action, the instructor is encouraged to discuss the situation, while maintaining confidentiality, with knowledgeable colleagues, his/her division dean, or the VPAA. A specific action of restitution and education should utilize the skills and strengths of the student (e.g., teaching a pro-bono word processing session for a major in computer information who violated a policy in preparing an assignment in computer programming). Part of any restitution or education is that the instructor give a full explanation to the student concerning the appropriate behavior which should have been followed in the assignment where the violation took place. Some suggestions for restitution and education include asking the student to:
- complete another assignment (e.g., write an additional paper to the one in which the offense was committed).
- provide some private restitution to the owner of the written or published work which was violated.
Academic Dishonesty Appeal Process
- If the student wishes to appeal the decision, within 15 working days he/she must send a written request to the Division Dean for a meeting with the Dean and the Instructor. The Dean will convene the meeting with the instructor and the student and attempt to resolve the issues.
- Should the resolution be unsatisfactory to the student or the instructor, either party may submit a letter to the Vice President for Academic Affairs (VPAA) or an administrator designated by the VPAA within 10 working days of the meeting in Step 1 describing his/her basis for continuing the appeal. The request should include a description of prior attempts to resolve the issue and the reasons for continuing the appeal. The VPAA will collect relevant information and meet with the instructor and student together or separately before making a final decision.
- The final decision made by the VPAA or the designated administrator will be based on a review of Steps 1 and 2, materials that have been submitted and the process that has been followed. There is no further appeal.
No legal counsel will be present during the academic dishonesty appeal process. The student may withdraw the appeal at any juncture by a written request to the Division Dean who will notify the Vice President for Academic Affairs.
Legal Penalty for Tampering with Education Records
No person shall knowingly tamper with records (files, documents, etc.) held at the College of Mount St. Joseph, or tamper with computer software or data, or knowingly gain unauthorized access to computer systems. Ohio Revised Code 2913.04 and 2913.42 defines and establishes criminal codes for tampering with records and unauthorized access to computer systems. Violators are subject to state prosecution. The College’s policy for addressing cases of record tampering or unauthorized access to computer systems can result in a person’s 1) suspension, 2) rescission of a Mount degree if the violation is discovered after graduation, or 3) prosecution.
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