Chance of getting caught cheating is unlikely, says students
By Rana Nabil Diab
News Reporter
February 13, 2008
 The results of a survey conducted in January 2006 to determine academic integrity among students and faculty at the University of Windsor were released last week by the Academic Integrity Committee.
This is the first survey undertaken by the Committee to look at academic honesty. The main objective was to assess the University of Windsor in terms of the practices of and importance placed on academic integrity.
The study revealed that less that 30 per cent of all participants, faculty and students, believe there is a high chance that students will get caught cheating. Faculty respondents had a much lower perception about their students’ knowledge of rules concerning academic policies that did students. Students also overwhelmingly rated the course syllabi and professors as their only sources for learning about academic integrity policies.
“There is obviously a lack of awareness on campus. The Academic Integrity Officer has done a great deal to publicize the rules against cheating, and the penalties which are applied to those who break them. But in spite of all that effort, students say they don’t know where to find information and professors say the penalties aren’t sufficiently severe,” commented political science professor Heather MacIvor.
Student respondents perceived the faculty of engineering to have the highest levels of cheating and plagiarism (60 per cent). In contrast, 20 per cent of students thought the Faculty of Nursing has the lowest percentage of cheating during tests or exams.
Students also considered copying from someone else during an exam as the most serious offense and rated plagiarizing a paper or purchasing it as the least serious of the offences.
Faculty responses were the complete opposite with the number one most serious offence being plagiarizing or purchasing an assignment and the least being copying from someone else during and exam without professor knowledge.
Nearly 70 per cent of students reported that they had suspected someone cheating in the past year, however, only 10 per cent indicated that they ever reported a student for cheating. In general, students reported that they do not feel that it is their job to monitor other students when it comes to cheating. Not surprisingly, almost 80 per cent of respondents said that they would “very unlikely” report a close friend.
“Students say it isn’t their job to turn in other students. But if they turn a blind eye, who is supposed to protect the integrity and the value of their degrees? Students know a lot more about what their fellow students are up to than a professor can ever know,” added MacIvor.
It is not only students who turn a blind eye to cheating. Over 50 per cent of faculty responded that they too had ignored a suspected cheating case in their classes. The reasons these members gave for ignoring the incident was insufficient proof of cheating. Overall, 56 per cent of faculty believed that cheating is a serious problem on campus. However, the reality is that less than one per cent of the Windsor students are investigated for misconduct.
Part of the problem stems from the faculty perception of how the University deals with cheating cases, which is that University action on student cheating would likely be a warning or a reprimand. The preferred action they would like the university to take should be more severe.
“Half of professors say that they’re not reporting their suspicions of cheating because they “don’t have enough evidence. In my experience, the evidence of cheating leaps right out at you. So I think some of the professors who gave that answer are copping out. It takes a lot of time and energy to enforce the academic integrity rules, and they can’t be bothered,” claimed MacIvor.
“I do not find any evidence of deliberate cheating in my classes. I have never had any problem with the senior administration in this faculty, or the University as a whole, failing to back me up,” reported Larry Glassford, assistant professor in the Faculty of Education.
“The Academic Integrity Office (AIO) is taking steps to address some of the issues that have surfaced from this survey. These include meeting with faculty councils and ongoing attempts at awareness through the poster campaign, the web site, and in-class workshops,” said Danielle Istl, Academic Integrity Officer for the University.
Istl added, “Based on the survey results, areas that need attention are improving the perception relating to chances of “getting caught,” increasing the effectiveness of University academic integrity policies particularly as it relates to faculty perceptions, I am hopeful this will occur when the new By law 31 is implemented very soon, increasing policy discussion in individual faculties and individual classes, and emphasizing what kind of group work is appropriate and inappropriate. The AIO counts on individual faculty members to deal with these last two items in their classes.”
The University is also working on having students use the web site Turnitin.com, which allows them to submit their work to be searched for plagiarism.
Students who are interested in obtaining more information about plagiarism can contact the Academic Integrity Office to book a workshop given by a student volunteer.
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