ADMINISTRATIVE RULE NO: 7030-02

RELATED TO POLICY SERIES NO: 7030

TITLE: ACADEMIC INTEGRITY AND HONESTY

PURPOSE

The purpose of this policy is to establish a clear understanding and expectation that awarding college credit requires honesty and integrity in how students portray their learning.

STATEMENT

Students at LBCC are responsible for pursuing their studies with honesty and fairness, and in a manner that respects the rights and dignity of others. Students must not engage in acts of dishonesty. Academic dishonesty includes, but is not limited to,      acts such as forgery, changing or misuse of college documents and records of identification, cheating, plagiarism, aiding or abetting cheating or plagiarism, knowingly furnishing false information to the college, violating copyright or trademark, or copying college software.

Faculty are to be clear about their expectations regarding student academic work, and it is recommended that the syllabus clearly explain what is considered a violation of academic integrity and the consequences for a violation. Students bring a variety of culturally- and generationally-based ideas of how to complete assigned work. Setting clear expectations ensures that all students have the same opportunity to excel in meeting the learning outcome. Faculty are encouraged to explain academic integrity issues to students early in a course.

Plagiarism is a type of academic dishonesty that involves the theft of another person’s idea, words, images, music/sounds, or creative works and/or deceit in the representation of who created the work by not properly crediting sources. Plagiarism, one form of cheating or dishonesty, is not just the failure to give credit for an exact quotation. Plagiarism includes both intentional and unintentional acts, such as:

  1. Obtaining a paper on the Internet and turning it in as the student’s own work; this is obviously intentional;

  2. Copying sections of another’s original document, photographs, artwork, songs/sounds, film, video images, lab project, or electronic files and putting the source material or text into one’s own work without documentation, as if it were one’s own original work;

  3. Copying a sentence, or an important exact phrase of two words or more, or a coined word (which may or may not have copyright protection) without the use of quotation marks and credit;

  4. Copying the structure of another’s argument or premise, thesis, theory, design, or composition and merely translating key parts;

  5. Using another’s results in one’s own words without giving him or her credit, failing to document any borrowing when quoting, paraphrasing, summarizing, or importing and placing a graphic, sound bite or other medium.

Academic dishonesty may involve the misuse of electronic devices. Cell phones or other similar wireless electronic devices must not be used during any test, quiz, or other student assessment without the prior approval of the instructor/supervising staff member.

When an instructor believes a student has engaged in academic dishonesty, the student is to be invited to meet with the instructor within a reasonable amount of time to discuss the situation. The student shall have an opportunity to explain or describe what they did. Faculty are encouraged to apply the values of the college and the principles of restorative justice to the analysis of the situation, as they see fit. After making a decision, an instructor has the right to issue a grade of “F” or “NP” for the assignment or course when the instructor has sufficient information to reasonably believe the student violated this policy. The instructor is to notify the Manager for Student Conduct and Retention about the incident, the student(s) involved, the course, and the consequences by submitting an Academic Misconduct report form at https://linnbenton.edu/report-it    

Consistent with the policy on grade appeals, the student may file a written appeal of the faculty member’s decision to the academic dean/director. A hearing will be held in-person or electronically, allowing the student to have an opportunity to be heard by the academic dean/director. In the case where an academic dean/director is the instructor, the dean/director assigned to supervise the course will hear the appeal.

The decision of the academic dean/director will be forwarded to the instructor, the Manager for Student Conduct and Retention, and student within 30 days upon receipt of the appeal. The academic dean/director’s decision concerning the grade shall be final.

The Manager for Student Conduct and Retention may initiate an investigation and consider additional consequences to be administered when misconduct reports reveal repeated acts of dishonesty which may be a violation of the Student Rights, Responsibilities, and Conduct Code (AR 7030-01).

DATE OF ADOPTION: 08/13/84

DATE(S) OF REVISION(S): 08/15/00, 6/5/14; 11/1/18; 04/07/22

DATE OF LAST REVIEW:11/1/18; 04/07/22