About Academic Integrity
Why is academic integrity important?
An academic community is composed of learners—individuals dedicated to an open exchange of ideas, who share their ideas for the purpose of improving knowledge for all people. In order for this academic enterprise to be successful, we must embrace basic principles that serve to guide our interactions. These principles include:
Courage
Fairness
Honesty
Respect
Responsibility
Trust
Violations of these principles disrupt the balance of the academic enterprise and ultimately diminish its success. On a purely pragmatic level, adherence to these values provides useful life training. These values should carry forward into life beyond the academy—to your career and to your work within the community at large.
Three Common Misconceptions About Academic Integrity
Speaker, Kennedy Alexis: The most common misconception about academic integrity is that students can reuse work submitted in one course into another. Professors of major courses want students to learn specific topics. This often leads to similar work being assigned in different courses, but it is dishonest for students to resubmit work. In fact, this is called self-plagiarism, and plagiarism goes against the University at Buffalo’s academic integrity policy.
Speaker, Kelly Ahuna: Another common misconception about academic integrity is the level of student accountability for protecting their assignments against cheating. At UB, it is the responsibility of every student to protect their own work. This means that if you leave your laptop unattended and someone copies your assignment, or if you lose your USB drive and someone copies your homework, you can still be charged with Aiding in Academic Dishonesty. It’s not up to the instructor to determine how the cheating occurred; instead it’s up to students to make sure that the cheating doesn’t happen in the first place. So, you always want to make sure to protect your belongings.
Speaker, Loretta Frankovich: Another common misconception is that because everything is online, all resources are allowed. However, please check your syllabus or check with your professor to see if you are able to access resources other than those provided to you, especially when the assignment is graded. If your homework or quiz tells you not to go to a particular website for answers, please don’t. You’ll probably end up with a violation. Do your own work, even if it’s not perfect!