Not so long ago, academic honor code violations consisted primarily of college students being accused of using “paper banks” to buy other people’s papers to use as their own or – in a throwback to elementary school days – copying answers from a neighboring classmate during an exam.
Academic honor code violations can materialize in many different forms today, especially with the sophisticated online technology and resources available to students. To protect yourself and your academic career, it’s important to know what to do and what your rights are if you are accused of an academic honor code violation.
In this blog, the student defense lawyers at DC Student Defense in Washington, DC break down everything you need to know if you find yourself in the middle of an academic honor code violation allegation.
How Students Get Accused of Plagiarism by Plagiarism Detection Software
Today’s college student is most likely to be accused of plagiarism because their professor uses some kind of “plagiarism software” like Turnitin to “catch” cheaters by detecting matches in the student’s paper with other internet-published work. However, matches detected by Turnitin don’t necessarily mean plagiarism is present.
Turnitin itself repeatedly emphasizes, and the universities repeatedly ignore, that there is a very distinct difference between what Turnitin flags as matching text (aka: similarity index) and plagiarism.
Turnitin will highlight ANY matching material in a paper—even if it is properly quoted and cited. Just because it appears unoriginal does not mean it is plagiarized; it just means that the material matches something in the Turnitin databases.
However, since nearly everything is now on the internet, relying solely on software like Turnitin to detect plagiarism does a disservice to students. By simply comparing words for matches, the likelihood of unmerited cheating accusations is higher. Alternatively, professors should read and carefully examine their student’s work before concluding that plagiarism is or isn’t present.
How do Students Get Accused of Cheating on Exams with Smart Phones?
New technology also creates new types of violations, so the ubiquitous use of smart phones gives rise in turn to a proliferation of smart phone aided violations. The most prevalent of these new smart phone academic violations is the accusation that a student has used their phone during an exam.
The college and university’s theory: why bother copying from your neighbor when you can just access the answer online? Online access not only allows students to “use the encyclopedia” (or more likely “Wikipedia”) to answer questions during the exam but even potentially to access their notes from class as well as the professor’s notes posted on online in systems like “Blackboard” and other online tutoring services like Chegg – Chegg in particular has been involved in a number of large scale cheating scandals where students sought answers to exams from Chegg during the exam.
Since most schools have rules that prohibit bringing your smartphone into an exam or having it out, a parent might naturally ask: “Why would you have your phone out during the exam?” While this is an understandable reaction to hearing that your student has been accused of cheating during an exam – the parent may want to consider that a more reasonable question to ask a college student (or high school student) is “When do you NOT have your phone out?” The answer to that (“never”) answers the question why so many students end up being accused of violating the prohibition against having their smart phones out during exams.
How to Defend and Protect Students Against Academic Honor Code Violation Accusations
The best defense is a good offense and I recommend using the UGH system:
U: Understand
G: Gather
H: Habitualize
UNDERSTAND
- Understand your professor’s requirements. Do they have a preferred method of citation? A preferred style manual? Many students do not even know that different kinds of papers in different subjects have wholly different styles of citation. While you do not have to master each one you do need to know which form of citation your professor (and school) require.
- Understand the accusation. If you are accused of an academic violation be sure you carefully read the accusation, so you know what is being challenged.
- Understand the process. Academics do not specialize in writing rules and laws so most university conduct and academic codes are hard to understand. Sometimes the people applying them do not even fully understand them. Here is where having a college student defense attorney with a proven track record of defending students against these allegations on your side can be critical.
GATHER
- Gather the evidence in your case. Emails, notes, and drafts of your work in plagiarism and test cases can be critical evidence.
- Gathering may require professional help. Often times, electronic evidence may appear to be lost through deletion but professional computer forensic experts can recover much of that information. But you will only want to use such an expert when they are under the direction of a student defense lawyer working for you because otherwis, the expert’s work will not be privileged and confidential.
HABITUALIZE
- Habitualize yourself to routines that protect against problems with plagiarism. Cite as you go. Do not wait until the end of your paper when you are up against a deadline to formalize your citations. Cite as you research and as you draft.
- Habitualize yourself to leaving your cellphone behind. Leave it in your room. At most put it inside your backpack and put the backpack somewhere safe but out of reach.
Following the UGH method can help minimize the chances of being accused and maximize your chances at a successful defense. But, most importantly, don’t take such accusations lightly. Your academic records are your professional records. Protect them.
