Cheating the system

In front of a large hall of fidgeting students preoccupied with Twitter and Facebook, the professor’s tired voice begins to speed up.

“Okay, last section of the course outline before you’re free to go today: academic integrity.”

Some students’ faces flicker to the front of the class while the majority continue to stare at their screens.

The professor reads through the blurb, in this case, to a group of fourth years who have heard a similar speech 40 times before.

Despite the ubiquitous nature of this scene, this year 1-2 percent of the student population will be charged with academic dishonesty, and one national study found that 53 percent of undergraduates report committing serious cheating on written work at least once. The fact is, students cheat.

It’s easy to blame this on the system or the policy but in reality, the responsibility for academic integrity lies with the course instructor and you the student. However, McMaster needs a culture shift to focus on academic honesty, in order for these statistics to change.

The McMaster Academic Integrity Office is the body on campus that oversees the faculty adjudicators that evaluate allegations of academic integrity. They are also responsible for educating students and professors about the academic integrity policy.

“Plagiarism is the number one most common type of academic dishonesty that you see, and one of the challenging things for this office is that we can talk about it at a really high level but students want to know from a really practical point of view — what am I supposed to do?” said Andrea Thyret-Kidd from the Academic Integrity Office.

Some people may argue academic integrity doesn’t matter — that students are under a lot of pressure and university is a special context. But many studies have shown correlation between academic dishonesty in university and unethical behaviour later on in life.

The obligation to elaborate on how students can be academically honest in a given course, lies with the students and professors themselves.

Professors have the responsibility to be clear about their expectations.

“This is one of the most challenging things for students is that what a professor expects—there’s not one rule for the university. Every assignment you do you can expect a different level of collaboration,” said Thyret-Kidd.

Students have the responsibility to report if other students are being dishonest or if a professor creates conditions of dishonesty, for example using the same exam year after year.

The Academic Integrity Office receives complaints, often anonymous, from students.

“Yes, we do get anonymous reports and we will look into anonymous reports ... but we have to make sure anonymous reports are not malicious,” said Thyret-Kidd.

When they have anonymous reports, they always follow up to find independent verification.

“Over the years, almost all the times where students have come in to make complaints, they have been correct. There’s only been one or two times where we have not been able to find verification of it,” she said.

But even though the office allows anonymous reports, it is likely that academic dishonesty is still underreported at the university, given that a survey of Canadian undergraduate students by Guelph researcher Julia Christensen Hughes found that 53 percent of students reported serious cheating on written work one or more times. Furthermore, 45 percent of undergraduates were certain another student had cheated during an assessment.

The lack of reporting of these incidents may be because students don’t understanding their obligation under the act, or don’t understand what constitutes academic honesty.

What you had to say

The Silhouette conducted a survey among students to find out what you had to say about academic integrity at Mac. Here are a few anonymous responses:

Q: Do you think the university does enough to make you aware of the academic integrity Policy?

A: “Not really. It’s obviously always in course outlines but no one reads that. There are definitely some grey areas that could be better addressed.”

Q: Do you think academic integrity is sufficiently enforced at Mc- Master?

A: “I think when detected it is, but for smaller programs where academic dishonesty is rampant (posting of old essays online for younger generations to use as a base/source) I think it’s swept under the rug and only brought out as a threat.”

The Silhouette conducted a survey with results that corroborated the idea that the lack of reporting may be due to a lack of understanding. Many students who responded said they were not confident that they could explain the academic integrity policy to a friend. Some respondents were also unsure whether or not they had ever breached the academic integrity policy.

Students have the responsibility to ask professors for clarification to fully understand what the assignment is.

“If you don’t understand what you’re supposed to be doing, you should ask,” said Thyret-Kidd.

Moreover, some parts of the policy are deliberately ambiguous, as it up to the professor to explain the constraints for the purpose of the course.

The majority of survey respondents said their professors typically discuss academic integrity at the beginning of the term.

However, as this investigation shows, the status quo is insufficient to address academic dishonesty which has remained consistent at McMaster and other universities. This suggests the way professors and students discuss academic integrity is not working.

What’s really needed is a culture shift in the way professors discuss academic integrity and how open students feel about asking for clarification on what’s allowed in terms of collaboration and writing.

In the past, a more open culture seemed to exist.

“In the olden days, professors used to leave the old exams or midterms in the libraries for students to access to study with,” said Thyret-Kidd.

However, when asked about how many professors do this, the librarian at Mills was unsure. Professors can now put  old exams up online but this practice is not widespread, and it is unclear how to access these materials online.

One way to encourage more dialogue on academic integrity is for more research to be conducted on this subject at McMaster.

The study by Christensen Hughes found that students who don’t see an evaluation as a legitimate means of evaluating knowledge were more likely to cheat. It is thus important to create a learning environment where students feel like they are being fairly evaluated on their knowledge.

The Office of Academic Integrity has worked in the past with the Centre for Leadership and Learning.

In-house research on academic honesty could be an important catalyst for change at McMaster. There are many intersections between effective pedagogy and academic honesty, which means the McMaster Institute for Innovation and Excellence in Teaching and Learning could incorporate academic honesty as a new research area with relative ease.

Furthermore, dialogue is already underway at an administrative level at McMaster around academic honesty in terms of the MSAF, but more open and transparent conversation on academic honesty should be had, with students at the centre.

McMaster has the resources to create a culture shift. What remains to be seen are whether these resources will be mobilized.