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MYP Programme - Academic Honesty Policy and Procedures

This document is to be read and implemented in conjunction with the Middle School Assessment Policy. At Discovery College we are committed to academic honesty and will continually strive to ensure that students, their families and staff understand what responsibilities this commitment embraces. The purpose of this policy is to outline what academic honesty means and the Middle School’s procedural responses to instances of academic dishonesty.

The spirit of this policy is wholly aligned with the secondary school's commitment to restorative practices. As such, teachers should use their discretion when implementing this policy and reserve its use for significant infringements. Minor instances should be regarded as 'teachable moments' and teachers should feel free to exercise their professional judgement in dealing with minor and/or unintentional instances of academic honesty infringements.

1. What we believe

At Discovery College we believe that honesty is a virtue and that all members of the College community have an obligation to treat the work and ideas of others with integrity. Towards this end the College commits itself to educating its community on what academic honesty is, how to be academically honest and how to take responsibility for the representation of their own, and others, ideas.

A. We believe that all students:

  1. should be honest in presenting all their school work
  2. should not cheat
  3. should seek inspiration from the ideas of other people and understand that it is OK to use the ideas of others, they just need to be acknowledged
  4. should understand that their teachers value their ideas and want them to present their ideas using their own language and voice
  5. should know that you must say ‘no’ to others who want to copy their work
  6. should know that working in groups can be a wonderful learning experience, and what they present to your teacher is their own work, expressed in their own words
  7. should understand the benefits of properly conducted research and respect for the creative efforts of others
  8. should be given the opportunity to understand what academic honesty is and how to uphold the College's academic honesty expectations

B. We believe that all teachers:

  1. should model good practice in academic honesty
  2. should provide clear guidelines for learning tasks
  3. should promote the benefits of properly conducted research and respect for the creative efforts of others
  4. should design learning tasks that require thinking skills, and are not able to be completed by simply copying or falsifying information
  5. should ensure that all their students understand a task's requirements
  6. should follow through with appropriate consequences when encountering instances of academic honesty
  7. should use anti-plagiarism tools as teaching instruments in raising awareness of academic honesty
  8. should make clear what the expectations are regarding academic honesty, such as referencing, bibliographies etc
  9. should scaffold larger tasks, with opportunities to submit interim work or with milestone checks, to help students maintain their own 'voice' in completing these tasks

2. Definitions of terminology used to describe academic honesty:

Academic honesty:
Behaving and working honestly in researching and presenting schoolwork. This includes respecting the ownership of the ideas and material of other people, and behaving appropriately when sitting exams (IBO 2003 and 2009).
Plagiarism:
The representation of other’s thoughts or work, as the student’s own in order to gain an unfair advantage. This includes using others work without citation or sourcing (IBO 2003 and 2009).
Collusion:
Allowing one’s work to be copied or submitted for assessment by another (IBO 2009:3). There are times when students will collaborate with other students to complete their work. However, the final work must be independently produced, despite the fact it may be based on the same or similar data and/or research as another student (IBO 2009:4).
Duplication:
Presentation of the same work for different assessment components or course requirements (IBO 2003:2).
Cheating:
Gaining an unfair advantage, including:
  • Falsifying a record, data etc
  • Use of mobile phones to text outsider, camera facility
  • Using notes in a test
  • Using a mobile to download information
  • Commissioning another person to do the work
  • Stealing papers, or downloading free papers from the internet
  • Using an electronic language translator to ‘launder’ language
  • Having a parent or tutor do assignments/assessments
  • Submitting work, which has been submitted by yourself or another student for a previous or different assessment task, or for a task at a different school
  • Submitting work for one subject which had been submitted for another subject
Intellectual property:
Includes patents, registered designs, trademarks, moral rights and copyright. The law protects many forms of intellectual and creative expression (IBO 2003:2).

3. Processes & procedures

In dealing with any issues regarding academic honesty, regardless of the type of intervention used, the intention will always be to bring about a behavioural change in the student.

Students and their families will affirm their commitment to academic honesty by:

  • Acknowledging that they have read and understood this document
  • Signing and returning a declaration that they have read and understood this policy.

In addition to this, teachers may request students sign an Authenticity Declaration (found in the appendices of the Middle School Assessment Policy) with the submission of major tasks.

If a teacher suspects a student has deliberately committed an act of academic dishonesty, the flow chart below describes the procedures to be followed.

Flow chart for dealing with infringement of academic honesty policy

4. Blatant acts of academic dishonesty

The College reserves the right to deal with any student found to have been engaged in a blatant and/or serious act of academic dishonesty by using the consequences usually reserved for 3rd or 4th infringements.

5. Examples of conventions for citing and acknowledging original authorship

Students can access academic honesty tools, such as referencing tools from the Discovery College Library Online Resources site at http://www.netvibes.com/discoverycollegelibrary#Academic_Honesty.

Teachers and MYP students can also use PaperRate to access an immediate analysis of their work for plagiarism detection, spelling and grammar checks; style and word choice analysis, and other features at http://www.PaperRater.com/

6. References

  • Discovery College Library Online Resources. (2010). Academic Honesty. Available: http://www.netvibes.com/discoverycollegelibrary#Academic_Honesty. Last accessed 27 April 2010.
  • International Baccalaureate (2003). Academic honesty: guidance for schools. Geneva: International Baccalaureate Organisation. p1-21.
  • International Baccalaureate (2006). Ethical Practice. Geneva: International Baccalaureate Organisation. p1 .
  • International Baccalaureate. (2009). Academic Honesty. Available: http://occ.ibo.org/ibis/documents/general/specific_interest/malpractice/g_0_malpr_sup_0907_1_e.pdf. Last accessed 22 March 2010.
  • International School Ho Chi Minh City (unknown). Academic Honesty in the Middle School at the International School Ho Chi Minh City (Internal Policy). Ho Chi Minh City: International School Ho Chi Minh City. p1-4.
  • International School Moshi (unknown). International School Moshi Secondary School Academic Honesty Policy . Moshi: International School Moshi. p1-4.
  • Mankato Area Public Schools (Year unknown). Cheating and how to avoid it. Mankato Area: Mankato Area Public Schools. p1-4.
  • Moore, R and Davies L. (2009). Plagiarism in the Internet Age. Educational Leadership. 66 (6), p64-67.
 
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