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Best Practices For Faculty

What Faculty Can Do to Encourage Academic Integrity

The faculty member should:

  • Inform students of the academic integrity policies and expectations in their course;
  • Apply academic integrity policies and expectations equitably to all students;
  • Review the circumstances of a suspected academic misconduct incident with the student if possible;
  • Impose appropriate academic consequences and educational opportunities for academic misconduct;
  • Report academic misconduct incidents to the Campus Associate Dean of Student Affairs;
  • Initiate student conduct action through the Campus Associate Dean of Student Affairs for flagrantly dishonest and serious violations of integrity.

If the faculty member determines that the academic misconduct was the result of the student’s inexperience with academic standards or wishes the student to further their understanding of academic integrity concepts and skills, the faculty member may require that the student participate in an educational opportunity.

Educational opportunities can be provided by the classroom faculty member or through resources at the College. Educational opportunities can:

  • Focus on ethical decision-making in college and in students’ intended professions.
  • Provide students an opportunity to develop academic integrity competency skills such as summarizing and citing.

As examples of educational opportunities, faculty could require students to:

  • Discuss the SCCC academic integrity website or the Student Code of Conduct
  • Write a reflection paper about the importance of academic integrity
  • Complete academic integrity educational session/s on topics such as ethical decision-making and time management
  • Learn and apply academic conventions for citing sources
  • Learn and apply academic writing skills such as paraphrasing, summarizing, and citing.

There are many effective academic integrity tutorials available from other institutions. Here is one example from the University of Maryland Global Campus.

Academic Misconduct Examples  Suggested Consequences for Each Level
Level 1  

Misconduct is minor or results from inexperience with academic integrity principles and policies. 

Examples: 

  • collaborating on an academic exercise when it is possible that the rules weren't clear 

  • omitting in-text citations and/or a list of sources used in an academic exercise because of not understanding the citation process (unintentional citation errors are generally not reported to the Campus Associate Dean of Student Affairs) 

  • require educational opportunity/s 

  • require student to repeat/revise the academic exercise 

  • assign a reduced grade on the academic exercise 

  • assign a reduced grade for the course 
Level 2  

Misconduct is dishonest in character but less flagrant than Level 3. In some cases, the misconduct could be impromptu due to poor time management or other circumstances. 

 

Examples: 

  • copying another student’s work, including lab notes, mathematical equations, or computer coding for an academic exercise 

  • allowing another student to copy your work on an academic exercise 

  • earning credit for a group project when you did not contribute to the work 

  • giving another student credit for a group project when they did not contribute to the work 

  • copying another’s words without the use of quotation marks, in-text citations and/or a list of sources used in an academic exercise  

  • inventing citations for an academic exercise 

  • using paraphrasing software to plagiarize another’s work 

  • using unauthorized assistance or sources when preparing or writing an academic exercise 

  • submitting the same work for credit to two or more instructors without advance permission from the current instructor(s) 

  • collaborating on an independent academic exercise if contrary to stated guidelines for the exercise or course 

  • fabricating laboratory data or results 

In addition to Level 1 consequences, faculty may: 

  • apply a more severe academic consequence such as an F for the academic exercise  

  • report student for documentation purposes (creates a record in student’s personal file) 

  • initiate student conduct action through the Campus Associate Dean of Student Affairs 
Level 3

 

Misconduct includes actions that are flagrantly dishonest and serious violations of integrity. 

Examples: 

  • repeated academic misconduct 

  • tampering with online proctoring software 

  • having someone complete an academic exercise or course for you, including online courses 

  • posing as another person to complete an academic exercise or course 

  • contract cheating by using a third party to complete an academic exercise  

  • obtaining, distributing, and/or using test/quiz/exam questions/answers without instructor authorization 

  • selling or offering to sell inappropriate assistance in the preparation, research, or writing of an academic exercise 

  • altering attendance records or hours for a course or program 

  • forgery or alteration of any college document, record, or identification, including signatures 

In addition to Level 1 & 2 consequences, faculty may: 

  • assign an F for the course in most cases