Student Academic Policies Committee

Minutes, September 29, 2005

(Approved 10/20/06)

Present: Dr. Mark Brill, Mr. Erik Elam, Dr. Dale Courte, Dr. George DeMarco, Mr. Andrew Fist, Mr. Isiah Morgan, Mr. Wade Luckett, Dr. Danielle Poe

1. We began with a series of questions to organize our discussion about the UD policy on academic dishonesty:

What do we like about the current code?

What don’t we like about the current code?

What should the form of a new code be?

Should we change the code to emphasize honesty rather than dishonesty?

Are we happy with the procedures in the current code?

What kind of scope do we want for the UD honor code?

Do we want a committee to adjudicate violations?

Why do we want a UD policy on academic honesty?

Answering this question will be a foundation that will guide our future discussion. The answer to this question will begin with our discussion about the current policy.

The goal is to update the policy, which was approved in 1978, and has remained unchanged since that time.

We will compare our policy to other schools’ policies (St. Mary’s and Notre Dame, for example)

2. Purpose of UD academic policy: We need this document as a point of information to instill responsibility. We want to encourage people up front to be honest. To clarify and educate students about what constitutes cheating: Address deliberate cheating, Address ignorance about what constitutes cheating.

The current policy: As it stands it does not educate; it heavily emphasizes infractions. Rarely followed: In part, faculty take care of dishonesty individually as part of their relationship with the students; in part, faculty care of dishonesty individually because the current policy has no teeth. Faculty want a more rigorous policy as part of UD emphasis on academic excellence and increased rigor; a rigourous policy can help transmit excellence. We may use some sections from the current policy, but the new policy will have no resemblance to the current policy.

A new policy: Should reflect our culture of encouraging student education through positive interactions. Replace “academic dishonesty” with “honor code.” Change from a list infractions to what one should do. Begin with a statement of purpose (as the University of Miami does). Frame in terms of expectations of student behavior and why. Frame in terms of students’ commitment to the university. 3 parts: 1) UD’s identity 2) procedural issues 3) Guidelines for students to address violations. The third part will help to engender and recognize the importance of student-faculty relationships.

Statement of purpose: “rigor” “excellence” “community” are all key terms that we’d like to include. The emphasis should be on character development and on damage to the community when someone cheats. A balance between expectations and why cheating is problematic.

The new policy should be distributed in small groups of students, facilitated by students. Our vision in 5 years: this code would be part of the tour of campus and admissions process because we will be emphasizing the academic excellence in our community.

Procedure for enforcement of infractions: 1^st step: faculty member & student meet, chair would be the next level of enforcement or appeals. 2^nd step: should we have department committee? The advantage of a department committee is that they are best situated to judge whether or not cheating has taken place, and it may be difficult for people in other disciplines to recognize plagiarism. The disadvantage is that department committees may have too much of a conflict of interest. To address the concern about disciplinary competence, we could form an interdisciplinary committee (students and faculty). We continued to discuss various ways of forming a committee, but we did not come to a consensus on this question.

Adjourned at 4:20.

Danielle Poe