Academic Misconduct

Honor System and Standards of Academic Conduct

The academic misconduct prohibited by this policy includes the following conduct defined below: cheating, deception, exploitation, facilitation, plagiarism, sabotage, and stealing. Please refer to the policy for examples.

1. Cheating

Cheating is gaining or attempting to gain an unfair advantage in an academic exercise usually to avoid doing original work or to make up for lack of preparation. 

2. Deception

Deception is causing or attempting to cause someone to believe something that is not true. In an academic context, this includes, but is not limited to:

  • Falsification: Inventing or altering without instructor permission any information, citations, data, quotations, statistics, attendance records, assignments or other academic endeavors. 

  • Forgery:  Imitating or counterfeiting of images, documents, signatures or similar documents and representing them as true. Forgery also includes the misrepresentation of credentials, including but not limited to official academic documents, records, identifying documents, certifications or licenses. 

  • Grade Alteration: Attempting to or successfully changing a grade to benefit an individual or individuals.  Grade alteration also includes presenting without authorization an alternate or newly completed assignment in place of an already graded assignment in order to receive a different grade.

  • Lying: Making false statements, verbal or written, about academic matters, such as making false statements to justify missing class(es) or assignment(s), or knowingly providing false information in an academic integrity investigation.

  • Omission: Deliberately leaving relevant facts out of a full account of the truth in response to a direct question.

3. Exploitation

Exploitation is coercing another person to commit an act of academic misconduct, whether for their own benefit or the benefit of another person, through threats, intimidation, blackmail, extortion, bribery, offers of favors, or some other means.

4. Facilitation

Facilitation is providing assistance in committing or attempting to commit an act of academic misconduct, or providing resources that could be reasonably expected to lead to an act of academic misconduct. Facilitation can occur regardless of whether the facilitator gains an academic advantage.

5. Plagiarism

Plagiarism is falsely claiming ownership or misrepresenting the origins of work submitted for publication or an assignment. In other words, plagiarism occurs when an individual takes credit for work that is not their own without giving proper acknowledgement to the creator. Plagiarism can include the uncited use of someone else’s words, ideas, facts, opinions, theories, illustrations, tables, figures, text, images, source code, and/or other intellectual work, even if the material is located in the public domain and can be freely shared.

6. Sabotage

Sabotage is deliberately interfering or attempting to interfere with one or more students’ academic work through, but not limited to: tampering with, altering, damaging or destroying personal or institutional academic materials. Sabotage may also involve interfering with a learning experience including, but not limited to, obstructing or willfully disrupting class, laboratory, formal testing or examination times, proceedings or experiences, or other classroom or academic environments.

7. Stealing

Stealing is deliberately taking or attempting to take, without permission, any form of academic property or material so as to permanently or temporarily deprive others of access or use.