Academic Integrity

Policies, Procedures. and Resources for Faculty

Introductory Remarks

Teaching faculty bear the brunt of academic integrity: in addition to teaching and nurturing their students, they have to be aware of the possibility that someone might, knowingly or unknowingly, violate a tenet of academic integrity. Each teacher then has to decide whether to confront a student initially, and whether to then follow the procedures established by the University to officially deal with the matter. Some tools, such as Turnitin, have begun to help with certain areas of focus, such as writing a research paper, but even those are not comprehensive in scope.

Here are some of the ways students may accidentally or deliberately choose to violate the standards of academic integrity: unauthorized collaboration; copying just a few sentences from an electronic source without proper reference; falsifying lab or research data; receiving test questions or answers; copying from another [unknowing] student's test; getting substantial unpermitted help on assignments; fabricating or falsifying a bibliography, 'cut and paste' from written or Internet; using paper mills.

Some of the ways that faculty can[and must] actively promote academic integrity include: including information in syllabus [general language from University or adapted by academic department and/or specific to course]; remind students when assignments or activities are pending; actively discuss ethical actions and boundaries; specifically discuss plagiarism, be very specific on group work/collaboration rules; assess student's citation and referencing skills with written and Internet sources, and work with colleagues such as library faculty to address them via online tutorials, etc. Faculty need to be able to design assignments and assessments that encourage both meaningful learning and honest work. In addition, everyone needs to be consistent in their rules and enforcement. Students need to get the message that Indiana State University is serious about academic integrity.

Graduate teaching assistants very much need to be informed of University policies and procedures as well.