Office of the Provost

Faculty and Unclassified Staff Handbook Chapter 2 -- Academic Affairs

Academic Honesty

Policy

Membership in the FHSU learning community imposes upon the student a variety of commitments, obligations and responsibilities. It is the policy of FHSU to impose sanctions on students who misrepresent their academic work. These sanctions will be selected by appropriate classroom instructors or other designated persons consistent with the seriousness of the violation and related considerations.

Examples of academic dishonesty include but are not limited to: (1) Plagiarism, taking someone else's intellectual work and presenting it as one’s own (which covers published and unpublished sources). Using another's term paper as one's own, handing in a paper purchased from an individual or agency, submitting papers from living group, club or organization files, or using another's computer program or document are all examples of plagiarism. Standards of attribution and acknowledgment of literary indebtedness are set by each discipline. Faculty are encouraged to include disciplinary or class-specific definitions in course syllabi. Students should consult with their department or with recognized handbooks in their field if in doubt. (2) Cheating is unacceptable in any form. Examples include consultation of books, library materials or notes during tests without the instructor's permission; use of crib sheets or hidden notes; intentional observation of another student's test; receipt of a copy of an exam or questions or answers from an exam to be given or in progress; substitution of another person for the student on an exam or another graded activity; deliberate falsification of lab results; submission of falsified data; alteration of exams or other academic exercises; and collaboration on projects where collaboration is forbidden. (3) Falsification, forgery or alteration of any documents pertaining to assignments and examinations. (4) Students who participate in promoting cheating or plagiarism by others will also be in violation of this policy.

Students participating in any violation of this policy must accept the consequences of their actions. Classroom instructors and/or university review/appeals committees and administrators will assess the sanctions for violation of this policy. The seriousness of the violation will dictate the severity of the sanction imposed. Academic sanctions may include but not be limited to any of the following:

* Verbal or written warning
* Lowering of grade for assignment/activity
* Lowering of term grade
* Failure of class assignment

Administrative sanctions may include but not be limited to either of the following:

* Suspension from the University
* Dismissal from the University

Procedures

The University guarantees students the provision of due process. Students are first expected, however, to avail themselves of the university's established tradition of informal appeal. Steps 1?4 describe the informal process. Steps 5-7 describe the procedures designed to implement a formal appeal at the graduate/undergraduate levels.

Step 1: The faculty member decides whether or not a violation of the Academic Honesty Policy has occurred.

Step 2: The faculty member informs the student and the department chair that a violation of the Academic Honesty Policy has occurred. It is the faculty member’s obligation to select or devise an academic sanction consistent with the severity of the violation.

Step 3: The faculty member informs the student of the academic sanction and the process of appeal. If the sanction involves a lowering of a term grade, the faculty member informs the registrar of the change.

Step 4: If the student disagrees with the faculty member’s allegation and/or recommended sanction, the student pursues the university’s longstanding tradition of informal appeal by consulting with the faculty member, and, if the student still disagrees, by appealing to the department chair.

Step 5: If after the informal appeal, the student still disagrees with the faculty member’s allegation or recommended sanction, the student may appeal in writing to the academic department no later than the end of the first week of the following semester. The department chair will provide the student with formal (a) departmental appeal procedures for undergraduates and special students or (b) departmental graduate appeal procedures for graduate students. (See specific written departmental appeal process.)

Step 6: a) Graduate students:

If a graduate student disagrees with the allegation(s) or recommended sanction in the informal procedure, the graduate student may formally appeal through the Graduate School’s graduate student appeals procedures. The formal graduate student appeal procedure begins with a written appeal to the department chair no later than the first week of the following semester. The written appeal should state the specific reasons for the formal appeal to the department.

b) Undergraduate/special students:

If the student is an undergraduate or special student and disagrees with the departmental allegation or recommended sanction, the student may appeal in writing to the Provost no later than 15 working days following the decision.

Step 7: For undergraduate and special students, an administrative hearing panel will be formed by the Provost to hear the undergraduate or special student appeal. The administrative hearing panel will consist of an academic administrator, assistant vice president for student affairs (assigned to work with student judicial affairs), four faculty members, and a student. The administrative hearing panel procedures for undergraduate and special students are available in the Office of the Provost.

Approved by President Edward H. Hammond (06-16-99).

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