Faculty Resources

Requirements for taking action:

All cases of suspected dishonesty must be reported to the Board, either through a BAH Incident Report Short Form or by forwarding a case to the Board for a hearing.

The only exception is when suspected dishonesty turns out to be a clear and simple misunderstanding in which case the matter can simply be dropped.

Faculty may not come to an understanding with a student on their own in a case of suspected dishonesty without using the short form or submitting a case.

The short form can only be used if the student admits to guilt and agrees with the instructor's suggested penalty. If the student does not admit guilt, the case must be forwarded to the Board for a hearing.

Consultation with the Board regarding the penalty suggested in a short form resolution is crucial to ensure that the case is handled in a way consistent with BAH procedures and precedents. Keep the following three points in mind:

  1. In no instance may you ask a student to withdraw from your course as part of a suggested penalty.
  2. Short-form resolutions should include some kind of penalty (usually a grade change, either for the work in question or the class) in addition to any other arrangements you wish to make with the student (such as rewritten work).
  3. In arriving at a penalty, please keep in mind that if a lab, paper, or exam is substantially compromised (a third or more of the work is plagiarized), simply failing the work in question is typically not a satisfactory penalty. A failing grade for labs, papers or exams that are substantially plagiarized is simply the grade the work deserves, as the work was not completed by the student. In such an instance, instructors should contemplate a further reduction in overall course grade to constitute the penalty portion of the dishonesty finding.
  4. If a grade penalty does not seem appropriate in a given case, please consult with the Chair of the Board before filling out the short form.

Keep in mind that once a student has been found guilty of academic dishonesty, s/he will have a file in the BAH office. Students guilty of academic dishonesty a second time face severe consequences, typically suspension or expulsion from the university. Faculty members who fail to report students to the BAH may well be responsible for guilty students' ability to avoid such serious consequences.

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Addressing Honesty in the Classroom:

Include a section on academic honesty on every syllabus. Make sure that you include the official academic honesty policy in its entirety, or provide a link to it: http://www.rochester.edu/College/CCAS/AdviserHandbook/AcadHonesty.html.

Professors are encouraged to add additional course-specific notes on academic honesty to their syllabi however, addendums should not contradict the policy.

Tips for Deterring Plagiarism:

Source: "What Can We Do About Student Cheating?" by Sally Cole and Elizabeth Kiss in About Campus, May-June 2000.

  1. Assign narrow and specific research topics.
  2. Don't allow last-minute changes of topic.
  3. Require that outlines be submitted three to four weeks prior to the deadline and that drafts be submitted with the final paper.
  4. Require detailed citations, including page numbers.
  5. Encourage students to visit the Academic Honesty web page for help determining what constitutes plagiarism and for guidelines for correctly citing sources and attributing ideas.
  6. Put the academic honesty policy in your syllabus.
  7. Clearly explain your expectations.
  8. Clearly spell out all rules and limits pertaining to group work.
  9. Encourage students to come to you if they are confused about citation practices or the rules for collaborative work.
  10. Be a good role model. Cite sources in your lectures. Talk to students about how citation shows respect for other scholars.
  11. Make it a point to talk with your students about academic honesty, and make sure they understand both the reasons and the tools for avoiding plagiarism or other dishonest acts. Remind them that you will hold them strictly accountable for the honesty of their work.
  12. Do not allow cell phones to be out during an exam.
  13. Seat students during an exam in such a way that they cannot see each other's work.
  14. Have proctors actively observe the students while they are taking their tests.
  15. Dictate that all backpacks, bags and books be closed and out of sight during the examination period.

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Tips for Detecting Plagiarism:

  1. Use Google, Altavista or other search engines to look for phrases or sentences that do not seem to have been written by the student. Put the phrase or sentence in quotation marks when you do the search.
  2. Verify that the student's work is actually on the assigned topic or task to insure that a student has not used a paper on a comparable topic by someone else from a previous year's class or obtained a paper from the web on a similar but not exactly identical topic.
  3. Be on the lookout for identical odd mistakes (in wording, spelling, etc.) that occur on separate papers or exams.
  4. If the class has a regrading policy, copy exams prior to returning them to students for regrading.

Frequently Asked Questions:

What should I do when academic dishonesty is suspected?

Where is the current version of the policy?

Where can I find a copy of the BAH Short Form?

  • What kinds of information should I include in my BAH report?
  • Class number and title
  • Semester and year of class
  • Description of dishonest act
  • Any evidence supporting your charge of dishonesty (websites from which unattributed material was taken, other students' work containing identical material, etc.)
  • Date of occurrence
  • Student's performance in class (attendance and grades)
  • Relative worth (in terms of grade) of work or test in question
  • Suggested punishment
  • Mitigating circumstances

NOTE: If you are pursuing the "short form" option with a student who has admitted his/her guilt to you, fill out only the information requested in the BAH short form itself. Consultation with the Board of Academic Honesty regarding the penalty is crucial to ensure that the case is handled in a way consistent with BAH procedures and precedents. In no instance may you ask a student to withdraw from your course as part of a suggested penalty.

Where do I send my BAH incident report?
Send the report along with all supporting documents to:
Elayne Stewart, Board Secretary
School of Engineering and Applied Sciences
Box 270076, Lattimore 306
How much can I say about an academic honesty case?
University officials, including faculty, are limited by the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). Professors should make it a rule not to discuss cases with any third parties once the case has been submitted to the Board. The consequences to the University’s reputation and to the rights of students, should a professor or staff member violate FERPA, are severe.
Am I obligated to pursue the short-form BAH procedure with the student?
No. Instructors and professors are free to pass along all cases of suspected academic dishonesty to the board without attempting a short-form resolution.

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