Proceedings 5th Asia Pacific Conference on Educational Integrity
The University of Western Australia
26-28 September 2011
| Educational integrity: Culture and values
Proceedings 5th Asia Pacific Conference on Educational Integrity |
The University of Western Australia 26-28 September 2011 |
Abstracts
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full papers, where these are available, or you may view these via [Contents: Full papers]
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Promoting ethical context in entrepreneurship education
M. Taufiq Amir
Bakrie University
taufiq.amir@bakrie.ac.id
Entrepreneurship education is one of the fastest growing sectors in higher education. Thousands of post-secondary institutions around the world have incorporated small business and entrepreneurship into their curricula and programs while there continues to be growing interest in entrepreneurship education. Most of these programs promise to shape and build entrepreneurial capacity of their graduates. To develop students' entrepreneurial spirit and skills, the good side of the entrepreneur's character is always expressed in a variety of related subjects. The characteristics of entrepreneurs which are often admired include high self-efficacy, and a high need for achievement, innovation, risk-taking, and vision. These characteristics arise as a main source of strength and success for an entrepreneur. However, the disadvantage is that ethics are rarely taught.
This paper addresses the need for providing an ethical context across the major subjects in entrepreneurship education by using ethical dilemmas in the application of entrepreneurship. It explains how entrepreneurs, especially during the early development of their ventures, confront specific ethical challenges. The different aspects that managers face in large organisations will be examined, whether business ethics courses in entrepreneurship education should be considered inadequate, and possible directions for future research are also discussed.
Enhancing academic integrity through holistic educative approaches: An Edith Cowan University innovation
Kate Andre and Melanie Lauva
Edith Cowan University
k.andre@ecu.edu.au, m.lauva@ecu.edu.au
Academic staff within the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Edith Cowan University have become increasingly concerned about the issue of academic misconduct within all course, but particularly those with large student enrolments and student cultural diversity. While anecdotal, evidence suggests that an increase in enrolment numbers, internet usage and changing student demographics have impacted on how students approach written assessments. With the advent of online submission of assignments, the problem of plagiarisim (intentional or otherwise) became even more apparent.
To address this issue in a sustainable, long-term and cooperative manner, a holistic approach has been developed to support students in understanding the need for professional writing standards. This presentation will explore how the issue of academic misconduct was identified and then managed in the School. In addition to providing staff support in educative and surveillance options, a whole of curriculum approach is under development to support students understand the need for professional writing standards. Having students understand the relationships between academic writing standards and professionalism; is an important informing principle in the design of educative and assessment structures within the nursing and midwifery programs in the School.
[Refereed research paper]
Deregulation and control in international education: What happens in private training establishments in NZ?
Subhash Appanna
AIS St Helens, Auckland, New Zealand
Sam Goundar
Bay of Plenty Polytechnic, Tauranga, New Zealand
subhasha@ais.ac.nz, Sam.Goundar@boppoly.ac.nz
The need for educational integrity intensified particularly after the effects of the public sector reform wave of the 1980s began to be felt by both education providers as well as governments. The prescribed toning down of government support, relaxation of regulatory "impediments", centralisation of market competition and concomitant proliferation of private as well as public providers resulted in the need for a cost-profit focus in providers and a quality-integrity focus in policy frameworks. In the non-university tertiary sector, numerous concerns and complaints continue to arise regarding "profiteering" and sub-quality performance in the provision of education. By way of response, both providers as well as public policy makers have been involved in designing innovative frameworks aimed at ensuring integrity and quality in the provision of education in what is essentially a highly lucrative and competitive international market. This paper critically analyses organisational responses to institutional requirements and expectations in the case of a private training establishment (PTE) in New Zealand. Data for this research comes from a number of secondary sources, on-going interviews with academics and administrators involved with organisations in the sector, and the personal experiences of the two researchers. It concludes that deregulation, re-regulation and a reliance on the market as well as internal organisational controls, opens up the industry to serious compromises in terms of integrity of education. The findings should be of interest to stakeholders involved in the tertiary education sector.
[Non-refereed full paper]
Investigating the use of the Plagiarism Reference Tariff
Jo Badge
University of Leicester, UK
Margaret Green
University of South Australia
Jon Scott
University of Leicester, UK
margaret.green@unisa.edu.au, js50@leicester.ac.uk
The Benchmark Plagiarism Tariff (Tennant & Rowell, 2010) was developed in response to concerns regarding the variability of treatment meted out in cases of plagiarism in the higher education sector. This Tariff allocates scores to specific factors such as history, level and extent of the plagiarism and establishes a proposed Tariff of penalties based on those scores. This paper reports on a retrospective review of 155 cases of plagiarism from 9 HE institutions from the UK, Republic of Ireland and Australia. Each case was evaluated using the Tariff and the proposed penalty compared with the actual penalty awarded. When penalties were compared in absolute terms, only 54% matched overall and there was significant variation between institutions. The areas of mismatch are discussed and also types of case, such as collusion identified where the Tariff is not effective. Nonetheless, the Tariff does provide a useful benchmark for giving equivalent weight to different cases within and between institutions and offers the potential for application of a consistent range of penalties.
Keywords: academic integrity, policy, plagiarism
[Refereed research paper]
Core elements of exemplary academic integrity policy in Australian higher education
Tracey Bretag and Saadia Mahmud
University of South Australia
Margaret Wallace and Ruth Walker
University of Wollongong
Colin James
University of Newcastle
Margaret Green
University of South Australia
Julianne East
La Trobe University
Ursula McGowan
University of Adelaide
Lee Partridge
University of Western Australia
tracey.bretag@unisa.edu.au, saadia.mahmud@unisa.edu.au, mwallace@uow.edu.au, rwalker@uow.edu.au, colin.james@newcastle.edu.au, margaret.green@unisa.edu.au, j.east@latrobe.edu.au, ursula.mcgowan@adelaide.edu.au, lee.partridge@uwa.edu.au
This paper reports on one important aspect of the preliminary findings from the Australian Learning and Teaching Council (ALTC) project, Academic integrity standards: Aligning policy and practice in Australian universities. Our project aims to identify approaches to the complex issues of academic integrity, and then to build on these approaches to develop exemplars for adaptation across the higher education sector. Based on analysis of publicly available online academic integrity policies at each of the 39 Australian universities, we have identified five core elements of exemplary academic integrity policy. These have been grouped under the headings, Access, Approach, Responsibility, Detail and Support, with no element given priority over another. In this paper we compare the five core elements identified in our research with best practice guidelines recommended by the Higher Education Academy (HEA) in the UK. We conclude that an exemplar policy needs to provide an upfront, consistent message, reiterated throughout the entire policy, which indicates a systemic and sustained commitment to the values of academic integrity and the practices that ensure it. Whereas the HEA created two discrete resources, the key aim and challenge of this project will be to develop exemplars that demonstrate a strong alignment between policy and practice.
Keywords: academic integrity, academic integrity policy, higher education
A web-based tutorial on avoiding plagiarism
Elizabeth Craven
University of Technology, Sydney
liz.craven@uts.edu.au
In 2008, in response to increased concerns about plagiarism in its many forms, the Teaching and Learning Committee of the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) requested the university's academic language and learning unit to develop a web-based tutorial on avoiding plagiarism that would be comprehensible to all UTS students, including non-English speaking background students. The need for a new web-based tutorial resulted from a review of academic integrity websites available at the time which seemed to assume that the students using them would have native-speaker proficiency in English. In developing the website at UTS we aimed to produce a tutorial that would be
Use of the website is monitored and evaluated through results recorded in the subject grade book and through Google Analytics.
An online competency based referencing training and plagiarism awareness task
Guy Curtis, Bethanie Gouldthorp, Emma Thomas and Geraldine O'Brien
Murdoch University
g.curtis@murdoch.edu.au, b.gouldthorp@murdoch.edu.au, emma.thomas@murdoch.edu.au, g.o'brien@murdoch.edu.au
Traditionally, in university psychology courses, referencing conventions have been taught within first year tutorials, and students' understanding of and competence with referencing has only been assessed when they have attempted written assessment tasks. For several years competency based referencing training has been used in first year psychology at the University of Western Sydney (UWS). Anecdotal evidence, and some data, suggests that the competency based referencing training at UWS has both improved referencing and reduced plagiarism among psychology students. We are currently implementing a similar online competency based referencing training and plagiarism awareness task at Murdoch University using an online learning management system. The task involves a series of online tests. Each test focuses on discrete elements of knowledge about what constitutes plagiarism, university policies relating to plagiarism, or on skills associated with American Psychological Association (APA) referencing. Students must complete each test with 100% accuracy before they can move to the next test. The series of tests must be completed before students submit their major written assignments. Several electronic protocols are used to manage students' behaviour and enhance their learning in the completion of the tests. This presentation will describe the competency based referencing training and plagiarism-awareness task and outline the research we are undertaking to evaluate its effectiveness.
Student plagiarism and academic integrity policies and procedures: Perceptions of university academic staff
Carmela De Maio, Katie Dunworth and Shelley Yeo
Curtin University
c.demaio@curtin.edu.au
This presentation outlines the preliminary findings from a study which investigated understandings of university academic staff of the concept of student plagiarism and their interpretations of the policies and procedures that govern student plagiarism issues. Data for the study were obtained from over 200 responses to an online survey distributed to academic staff in Western Australia's four public universities. Respondents included academic staff from all four universities, working in a wide variety of disciplines, at a range of levels from associate lecturer to professor.
The paper explores how respondents interpreted the concept of 'student plagiarism' in relation to their own experience, and the degree to which their interpretations were consistent with descriptions of student plagiarism within their university policies. It also identifies how academic staff reported that they responded to incidences of student plagiarism they encountered and the extent to which their responses coincided with the procedures established by their university.
Connecting the principles of educational integrity with practice
Jon Edwards and Wallis Edwards
University of Queensland
j.edwards4@uq.edu.au, w.edwards@uq.edu.au
Teachers in the Faculty of Science at the University of Queensland have developed a module that enables student engagement with issues of educational integrity at the course (unit) level. It takes the form of an online learning scenario. The design allows for tailoring to specific course requirements. Integrated into an assignment task, the module presents students with a structured corpus of relevant information and a series of corresponding exercises.
The effectiveness of the first deployment was measured using pre and post evaluation questions, embedded within the module. Students were asked to rate their level of knowledge and confidence in distinguishing collaboration from collusion and of maintaining educational integrity. Analysis of these data indicated a statistically significant, positive outcome.
One exercise required students at the start of the module to paraphrase a short passage and repeat this exercise at the end. Textual analysis revealed a contrasting picture to that of the quantitative evaluation. The paraphrasing skills presented did not accord with the reported improvements in knowledge and confidence. Some made verbatim reproductions of the passage both before and after, many simply used word substitution or superficial word reorganisation. Most failed to cite the source of the passage.
Whilst there was no expectation of a transformation from novice to expert simply by the introduction of this module alone, its use highlights an important consideration in engendering the practice of educational integrity; it is important that it is based upon investigations of "what students do, not what they say they do" (Walker, 2009).
Keywords: educational integrity, online learning, effectiveness, evaluation, paraphrasing
Reference
Walker, J. (2009). Measuring plagiarism: Researching what students do, not what they say they do. Studies in Higher Education, 35(1), 41-59. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03075070902912994
Sharpening students' understanding of academic ethics with assessment-specific online teaching
Wallis Edwards
University of Queensland
w.edwards@uq.edu.au
Few academics would question that there has been a significant increase recently in the prevalence of plagiarism in students' assignments. Pro-active teaching of academic ethics is required. Teaching must accommodate diverse methods of assessment including formal writing, documentary video making and e-conferencing. Also, the cross cultural diversity of the student body requires that teaching be based on practical examples, not abstractions, with immediate feedback and correction of misunderstandings. A set of distinctive, compulsory, assessment specific, online modules was developed for each of three courses within the Faculty of Science, University of Queensland. The modules were built in the University's Scenario Based Learning interactive program. Running the modules during the lead time for the assessments offers 'just in time' learning. The modules clarify nuances of ethical practice applicable in each assessment; for example they explain the degree of collaboration permitted in group work as opposed to individual work. Students who enrol in multiple courses gain knowledge of a range of academic ethical issues. Post-completion evaluations indicated a significant increase in students' confidence in their ability to apply the more rigorous ethical standards required by the University. For example, students were more confident of their ability to paraphrase a passage, a skill that obviates the temptation to cut and paste. Many were grateful for informed guidance on for example, correct ways to deal with copyright on images and music. This method seems more real to students than generic ethics teaching and is readily adaptable to a range of disciplines and types of assignment.
Keywords: academic ethics, plagiarism, collaboration, just in time learning, assessment methods
[Non-refereed full paper]
Academic integrity and the transition to higher education: Curriculum design for initiating a scholarly apprenticeship
Frances A. Gaynor
Macquarie University
fran.gaynor@mq.edu.au
An understanding of what constitutes academic integrity underpins a successful transition to university. The development of knowledge, skills and approaches informed by this understanding are essential for engaging with the practices of the academic community. This paper will unpack key aspects of the curriculum design used in the creation of three units developed for students in their transition to first year in higher education. In their scholarly apprenticeship students are guided to make informed, academically honest choices when selecting and utilising resources. An early focus on academic values is used to make these values explicit, later they are reinforced through pedagogy, resources, learning activities, assessment and feedback. Students are guided to engage with their disciplinary community and its expressed knowledge by applying critical thinking when selecting resources, when extracting and interpreting ideas, and then when acknowledging the contribution of others to the texts they create. The importance of establishing a process and a rationale for each aspect of the reading, thinking, writing cycle emphasises the negotiated nature of knowledge creation and dissemination. Equally, it develops the relationship between students and their disciplinary community by fostering a greater awareness of the use of academic conventions that must be adopted by novice writers. While each of the units developed for the transition to university targets a different discipline the fundamental principles of academic honesty are the same whether associated with collaborative or independent learning. These units attempt to lay a foundation for students to make appropriate choices, to engage confidently and to act with academic integrity in all aspects of their learning.
[Non-refereed full paper]
Academic integrity as a university responsibility: What is the readability of your policy?
Margaret Green and Gisela van Kessel
University of South Australia
Margaret.green@unisa.edu.au, Gisela.vankessel@unisa.edu.au
Problems in academic integrity are often assumed to arise because students do not understand the concepts, and/or consequences or do not have the required strategies to avoid problems. This paper takes an alternative point of view and explores the responsibilities of the university in facilitating appropriate student action. This study looked at the readability of the academic integrity polices of the 39 Australian universities using online 'readability scales'. All policies were found to score more highly on these scales than expected, indicating the documents could need up to 28 years of education to be able to interpret them. Additionally it was identified that policies were difficult to locate. In order to help students understand their academic integrity responsibilities policies need to be easily accessed and written in a way that makes them easy to read and comprehend.
Keywords: academic integrity, readability, organisational policy, education, plagiarism
How to preserve academic integrity in a market economy?
Asha Gupta
University of Delhi
ashagupta3452@gmail.com
Universities today are engaged not only in transmitting knowledge from one generation to another and serving as the custodian of national culture and identity but also in creating new knowledge and promoting the consumption of higher education. With the massification of higher education, they are striving not only for public but also private funding and thereby gradually drifting towards corporatisation, marketisation and academic capitalism.
The ethics of outside funding has jeopardised the very concept of academic integrity - the hallmark of the university system. Sometimes we find instances of research scientists tampering with their result findings and/or resorting to 'medicalisation' in order to serve the interests of their funders or pharmaceutical companies. In fact, the commodification and globalisation of higher education have led to de-professionalisation of academia, affecting adversely their autonomy, integrity, critical leadership and social prestige.
My paper seeks to focus on how to preserve academic integrity in a market economy. The issues at stake are: autonomy versus accountability, academic freedom versus cost-centered management, contract versus tenure jobs, input versus output, new corporatism versus academic solidarity, etc. The object is not only to trace the factors that have led to the decline in academic integrity but also suggest ways and means for restoring it despite the economy and globalisation. The methodology adopted is conceptual, analytical and factual. I will draw examples from India and my own experiences as an academic-administrator.
[Refereed research paper]
Curriculum redesign as a faculty-centred approach to plagiarism reduction
Sue Hrasky and David Kronenberg
University of Tasmania
sue.hrasky@utas.edu.au, david.kronenberg@utas.edu.au
The incidence of plagiarism is increasing, exacerbated by the availability of many information sources via the Internet. Traditional approaches for tackling plagiarism reflect two distinct philosophies: either educate the students or catch and punish inappropriate behaviour. Both philosophies assume that the responsibility for avoiding plagiarism is the student's so that whenever a problem is encountered, the blame rests with the student. The Australian Universities Teaching Committee (AUTC), established by the Australian Government in 2000, recommended a strategy reflecting a philosophy of sharing the responsibility for countering plagiarism across the student, staff and the institution. A key component of this approach relates to assessment design, which is the key focus of this paper. Practices regarding assessment and other strategies aimed at reducing the incidence of plagiarism at the University of Tasmania are documented and staff attitudes regarding the effectiveness of these strategies are identified. Impediments to implementing assessment strategies are also considered. By identifying both the strategies that staff see as effective, as well as the barriers to their implementation, universities can be forewarned about attitudes, obstacles, and associated resourcing implications that might be pertinent if the plagiarism response is to become a holistic one, in which all involved bear some responsibility.
Keywords: plagiarism, assessment, assessment strategies
Rethinking essay assessment to enhance educational integrity
Alison Jaquet
The University of Western Australia
alison.jaquet@uwa.edu.au
In this showcase session I will discuss the role of well-designed assessment in creating a culture of ethical and independent scholarship. To this end, I will speak to a particular model of written assessment that aims to instill key educational values of respect and responsibility - the Response.
The Response, adapts the traditional essay form, and is used as a form of written assessment in undergraduate learning in the discipline of English and Cultural Studies at UWA. The Response teaches students to value their own perspectives and develop their academic voices in a reflective, responsive writing exercise. For this reason, it has been particularly successful in the teaching of nineteenth century literature, a field saturated with critical material that can be difficult for students to navigate.
My research, in which student and teacher impressions of this assessment were sought, evaluates the success of the Response in assisting students to reflect, engage and learn. The findings suggest that when reflection is built into written assessment, students are more likely to reframe their academic challenges and enjoy the learning process. In this way, I argue that we can reduce academic misconduct by creating confident, respectful and empowered scholars who understand the values that underpin ethical writing and research.
The essay remains as a dominant assessment model across academia and so I anticipate that this discussion of innovative assessment models will be relevant to educators beyond the Humanities context.
[Discussion centred session, Non-refereed full paper]
The educational integrity of unit satisfaction surveys
Robert Kennelly
University of Canberra
rmkennelly@homemail.com.au
The unit satisfaction survey (USS) is an online survey that adopts some of the Course Experience Questionnaire (CEQ) style format to establish whether students are satisfied with a particular unit. It is open for students to complete for eight weeks at the end of semester. The results are used to improve teaching and learning and "are also available for use as part of professional development and review. There is no minimum response rate required for use of survey results" (University website). Detailed results and benchmarking are distributed to the unit convener, Head of Discipline, Associate Dean and Dean.
Advantages of the survey:
[Non-refereed full paper]
The impact of anticipation on accounting students' ethical decision making under time pressure
Hwee Ping Koh
The University of Western Australia
Glennda Scully
Curtin University of Technology
David R. Woodliff
The University of Western Australia
hwee.koh@uwa.edu.au, Glennda.Scully@cbs.curtin.edu.au, David.Woodliff@uwa.edu.au
Time pressure has been shown to have a negative impact on ethical decision-making. A consistent finding in plagiarism research is that students have been found to have a higher propensity to commit plagiarism when they are faced with time deadline pressure. However, no attention has been directed to the impact of the precursors to time pressure. This paper examines the impact of anticipated and unanticipated time pressure on ethical decision making using an experimental approach and reports the results of between and within-subjects experiments. Utilising 60 business school undergraduate and postgraduate coursework students at The University of Western Australia, we examine the differential impact of whether time deadline pressure was anticipated or unanticipated on students' propensity to commit plagiarism. We find support for our expectation that the propensity to commit plagiarism under time pressure is related to anticipation. Specifically, we find the propensity to plagiarise to be significantly reduced when time pressure is anticipated rather than unanticipated. The implications of this finding for policy development and curriculum design are explored.
Keywords: Plagiarism, accounting education, academic honesty, ethics, time pressure.
[Discussion centred session, Non-refereed full paper]
Evaluating the effectiveness of educational and academic integrity initiatives in higher education
James K. W. Lee
Queen's University at Kingston, Canada
Lee Partridge
The University of Western Australia
Jim.Lee@queensu.ca, lee.partridge@uwa.edu.au
The widespread recognition of the fundamental importance of academic integrity (AI) in higher education has prompted the development and proliferation of a variety of academic integrity initiatives to promote AI across the campus, and to educate students and staff on the expectations, standards, and policies of scholarly work in the academy. Examples of such initiatives include honour codes, revisions to AI policies, AI advertising campaigns (through posters or other means of communication), AI tutorials, sponsorship of an 'AI Week' on campus, AI handbooks for faculty members and students, academic workshops through the library, the use of text matching software to evaluate student submissions, providing faculty training on AI issues, and mandatory remediation programs for student cheaters.
Although the benefit of such initiatives is generally acknowledged, there are very few studies which have examined the effectiveness of such initiatives. Challenges in measuring effectiveness may be due to a variety of reasons, including the difficulty in establishing outcomes or identifying the most effective indicators which are suitable for assessment. The purpose of this discussion will be to ascertain the various kinds of AI initiatives that are used in universities, identify the main outcomes of such initiatives, and establish appropriate indicators which could be used to measure those outcomes. One goal from this work will be to undertake a study to determine the most effective AI initiatives and current best practices. A longer term goal of the study will be to develop a generic assessment framework for AI initiatives; benefits would include a greater potential for standardisation of best practices across universities - both nationally and internationally, inter-university benchmarking, and potential applications in quality assurance processes.
Key ideas
Anti-corruption through education in an Indonesian university
Marhamah
Islamic University of Jakarta, Indonesia
mar_yasin@yahoo.com
Formal education can be a legitimate player in the drive to address corrupt behaviors in today's society. One most basic approach would be to instill in our students anti-corruption values of honesty and integrity with the hope that once they internalise these values, they will in turn influence their peers and even put pressure on university institutions, and later on in the work place.
This study aims at determining how anti-corruption values can be integrated into the education system, and most especially, the curriculum. The study will explore ways and strategies of including anti-corruption values in curricula designs and actual lesson delivery.
Based on the objective reasoning, self-concept, and social identity theoretical frameworks, this presentation seeks to understand how anti-corruption values can be developed and inculcated in the higher education environment. The presentation suggests that developing personal qualities and appreciation of human integrity will help to empower students become agents of anti-corruption in society.
Discussion questions:
Degrees of dishonesty: Three perspectives on students' motivations to cheat
Helen Marsden
The Australian National University
helen.marsden@anu.edu.au
In an era in which the mantra of evidence based policy is endemic, the underpinning for policies and practices relating to student academic integrity in Australian universities remains relatively weak. The research reported here was designed to help address this deficit by developing a rich data set which could be used to support the development of relevant and appropriate interventions.
A number of issues relating to academic dishonesty (cheating) amongst students in Australian universities were examined from three different perspectives as part of doctoral research undertaken in 2005 and 2006. The three studies were conducted to explore the extent and nature of dishonest academic behaviour, together with an investigation of factors which might precipitate students' engagement in these activities. The first study comprised an extensive online survey which was completed by 9,549 students from 11 universities. Study 2 involved a series of five focus groups of students from three Australian universities with a total of 28 student participants (nine undergraduate and 19 postgraduate). The third study comprised a series of 19 semi-structured personal interviews with academic staff members - lecturers, tutors, and learning advisers - from 11 universities.
While the majority of modern studies of academic dishonesty have focused on situational correlates of cheating, these studies also explored possible links with both general strain (which has previously been related to delinquency and general deviance) and a measure of dishonest personality. This presentation provides an overview of the methodologies and major findings of all three studies.
[Discussion centred session, Refereed research paper]
Can a policy change practice? An evidence based approach to developing policy
Jennifer Martin and Karen van Haeringen
Griffith University
j.martin@griffith.edu.au, k.vanhaeringen@griffith.edu.au
Universities agree that there is a need to educate students about academic integrity and that the quality of the awards they confer on their students is compromised if students gain credit for work where breaches of academic integrity have been overlooked or not dealt with in a consistent matter. This paper describes how one university developed a new institutional framework and accompanying policy document in order to simplify the processes, ensure that students received educational assistance when required and respond to the dissatisfaction of academic staff with the existing policy and processes. The context for these changes included perceptions in the press that the numbers of cases of academic misconduct were increasing and an ever increasing reliance on electronic sources of information. The development of the institutional framework and the related policy are analysed using a policy cycle model and conclusions are drawn about the success of the policy implementation based on practice aligning with policy.
Key ideas
Evaluating educational approaches to academic integrity in Australian universities' policies
Ursula McGowan
University of Adelaide
Ruth Walker and Margaret Wallace
University of Wollongong
ursula.mcgowan@adelaide.edu.au, rwalker@uow.edu.au, mwallace@uow.edu.au
The literature on academic integrity and plagiarism issues in higher education is increasingly acknowledging the complexity of intentional and unintentional breaches. A recent shift in emphasis to educative approaches and the development of cultures of academic integrity is, perhaps, a result of the growing awareness that some academic integrity policies can miss the nuances of inadvertent plagiarism.
This showcase draws on data gathered as part of an ALTC funded project (Bretag et al., 2010). Publicly available policies about academic integrity / honesty / plagiarism on the websites of 39 Australian universities have been analysed. The educational approaches suggested in the policies are assigned to one or more of a series of categories, ranging from information provision, to individual counselling, group workshops and curriculum embedded approaches. In addition all identified references to educational approaches are categorised as either reactive or proactive. 'Reactive' indicates educational measures prescribed for dealing with offenders following identified breaches of academic integrity, and 'proactive' indicates approaches designed to establish and further a culture of academic integrity and/or as a pre-emptive measure. We examine various interpretations of the notion of 'educational' approaches identified in these policies, and then discuss the likely effectiveness of each of these approaches in terms of some currently held learning theories. In conclusion we arrive at recommendations on educational approaches that could be incorporated into policies and adopted by academics in order to improve learning outcomes as well as assist in forestalling and dealing with both unintentional and deliberate breaches of academic integrity.
Reference
Bretag, T., Walker, R., Green, M., East, J., James, C., McGowan, U., Partridge, L., & Wallace, M. (2010). Academic integrity standards: Aligning policy and practice in Australian universities. ALTC submission.
[Discussion centred session, Non-refereed full paper]
Educational integrity in policy implementation and practice: A virtue for African students and leaders for development
Chukwunenye Clifford Njoku
University of Malaya
clifnjoku@yahoo.com
Education empowers men and women who lead their society to make decisions in the best interest of their community on the basis of reason, understanding of the common good as nurtured in them in a life time of gathering information through learning. Western education as perceived in Africa has helped in the development of Europe and America through developing people with educational integrity and intellectual repute. Africa needs students and leaders of similar qualities and abilities puts into action the reasoning and wisdom acquired through education and experience. Many of the ethical dilemmas surrounding African growth problems are exacerbated by isolating educational integrity and African rich cultural values from policy implementations and practices in governance for transformation, hence development is marred. This paper adopts a historical narrative methodology to reflect on African rich cultural values, while examining African students and leaders in this light. It draws on the theoretical framework of Adjibolosoo's human factor for Africa's development theory, and concludes with modest recommendations.
Key ideas
How effective are business ethics courses? An examination of an eight week course
K. Praveen Parboteeah
University of Wisconsin
Kyung-Il Han
Anyang University, Korea
parbotek@uww.edu, kihan@anyang.ac.kr
Business schools are frequently criticised for the lack of moral reasoning of their students. One solution to this criticism has been to incorporate business ethics courses in the curriculum. However, the effectiveness of such courses has always been debated (Neubaum et al., 2009). We therefore contribute to the literature by examining how a Masters in Business Administration Business Ethics course changed the ethical perceptions of students. We conducted surveys at the beginning and the end of the 8 week course. We surveyed respondents on personal ethical philosophies (idealism - a person's unwillingness to harm other members of society, regardless of other outcomes and relativism - a person's adherence to universal rules of behavior regardless of situation), organisational ethics (triple bottom line) and the ability to recognise ethical situations.
Using ANOVA, we compared the survey scores before and after the course. We find that personal moral philosophies do not change. However, we find that both triple bottom line (should performance explicitly include social concerns?) and students' intentions to work for more ethical companies are higher. We also find that students have an improved ability to recognise ethical situations while also perceiving that organisations should operate more ethically.
This study shows that a short business ethics course had a significant impact on many aspects of business ethics. While personal ethical philosophies did not change, many other key important aspects of ethical perceptions changed. The teaching approach, the theoretical and practical implications of the study will be discussed during the showcase session.
Neubaum, D.O., Pagell, M., Drexler Jr., J.A., Mckee-Ryan, F.M. & Larson, E. (2009). Business education and its relationship to student moral philosophies and attitudes towards profits: An empirical response to critics. Academy of Management Learning and Education, 8(1), 9-24.
Developing authorial voice in research students: Combining concordancing and text matching software
Michelle Picard and Cally Guerin
The University of Adelaide
michelle.picard@adelaide.edu.au, cally.guerin@adelaide.edu.au
For many students learning to write effective academic texts, one of the major problems they face is the development of a confident and appropriate authorial voice. Even at postgraduate level, when students might be expected to have sufficient experience in academic writing to competently avoid plagiarism, significant numbers still find themselves inadvertently recycling language from other texts in inappropriate ways. While by no means limited to those using English as an additional language, we observe that it is a particular problem for those international students who are still developing competency in the grammar and syntax of English. Previous research has demonstrated that concordances searching discipline-specific corpora are beneficial in helping students determine discipline-specific language structures (Cargill & Adams, 2005), and that plagiarism detection software can provide valuable formative learning (Davis & Carroll, 2009). We have combined these software tools in a process designed to help research students mobilise discipline-specific language appropriately, but to do so using their own words. Trials with research students demonstrated a deeper understanding of what constitutes 'transgressive intertextuality' (Chandrasoma et al., 2004; Eira, 2005; Moody, 2007; Share, 2006), and improved language outcomes in successive drafts. When surveyed, participants indicated their increased ability to avoid plagiarism and to write confidently in their own authorial voice.
[Non-refereed full paper]
Academic cheating behaviour of accounting students: A case study in Jakarta State University
Anna Armeini Rangkuti
Jakarta State University
anna_rangkuti@yahoo.com
This study aims to reveal academic cheating behaviour amongst accounting students at a university in Jakarta. The sample numbered 120 second year students of accounting. The instrument has two dimensions, namely academic cheating during a test in class (Cronbach alpha reliability coefficient: 0.76) and academic cheating when doing tasks outside the classroom (Cronbach alpha reliability coefficient: 0.81). The results of this study indicate that academic cheating occurs both in test situations in classes and academic tasks outside the classroom. The university needs to create clear and firm academic regulations in anticipation of academic cheating. Academic regulations under consideration include procedures for examinations, forms of a test or assignment, the use of software to detect plagiarism, and strict sanctions applied to perpetrators of academic cheating. Keywords: academic cheating behaviour, accounting students
[Discussion centre session, Non-refereed full paper]
The road to loss of academic integrity is littered with SET: A hypothetical dilemma
Julie Reis and Jenny Klotz
University of South Australia
Julie.reis@unisa.edu.au, Jeanette.klotz@unisa.edu.au
Since the rise of audit culture within Australian tertiary institutions, Student Evaluation of Teaching (SET) questionnaires are widely used to provide evidence of quality teaching and to provide feedback about teaching effectiveness of academic teaching staff. Whilst the literature pertaining to SET as a tool for measuring teaching quality is extensive, enquiries pertaining to the relationship between SET, academic integrity, and ethical and professional obligations are lacking. Anecdotal evidence exists to support the notion for a potential loss of academic integrity amongst academic teaching staff especially when SET questionnaires are used as performance management tools that can determine employment and career paths. For nursing academics, there is an obligation to both the profession and to society in general to ensure that their graduating students will be safe and competent practitioners. Using an ethical principles framework, this paper presents a hypothetical ethical dilemma in order to highlight what could happen if teachers of undergraduate nursing students were to manipulate SET in order to demonstrate their individual teaching quality.
Keywords: student evaluation of teaching (SET), ethics, audit culture, quality
Key ideas
Should we be concerned about self-plagiarism?
Susan R. Robinson
University of South Australia
Susan.Robinson@unisa.edu.au
Recent years have seen a steady stream of journal editorials condemning self-plagiarism - the practice of recycling text between publications of the same author - and other forms of repetitious and redundant publication. The potential negative consequences of textual recycling are less obvious in the humanities and social sciences than they are in the biomedical sciences, where redundant publications may exaggerate the efficacy of clinical trials. The perceived evils of self-plagiarism vary widely across the academic disciplines, and this undermines the claim that self-plagiarism constitutes an academic integrity issue in all cases. This session argues that self-plagiarism on the part of academics is not always best treated as an academic integrity issue, and that talk of self-plagiarism distracts us from the conversations we should be having concerning the quality of the academic publications appearing in our subject areas. With a view to promoting these conversations, the session proposes that talk of self-plagiarism should be replaced with pronouncements around the notions of 'fortunate' and 'unfortunate' academic publication. Some examples of what might count as fortunate and unfortunate publication are given.
Keywords: integrity of academic staff; publishing integrity; redundant publication; self-plagiarism; unfortunate publication; scholarship; academic values
Fostering educational integrity in a pre-intermediate level EFL Japanese university class
Justine Michelle Ross
Doshisha University, Kyoto, Japan
saritojustine@hotmail.com
This presentation will outline a syllabus developed by the author and used with a first year pre-intermediate level EFL class in a Japanese university. This syllabus was designed to foster educational integrity and include activities that allowed students to express ideas and concerns about their own personal and cultural values. To accomplish this, first year students learning English as a foreign language needed to be taught first how to conduct research using the Internet, how to create their own learning materials, and how to present the results of their research using themes and topics relevant to the Japanese. The syllabus in focus helped students to further develop their English skills, critical thinking ability, and basic research techniques. Additionally, the author was able to maintain the educational integrity of the class whilst providing students the opportunity to acquire a more in-depth understanding of their native culture and personal values.
This syllabus can be adapted for use in Australia for the ESL classroom, whether it be in a language school or tertiary setting.
Forms of reason: Intercultural perspectives on the production of knowledge
Michael Seats
Curtin University
michael.seats@curtin.edu.au
In the Western academy, methods of evaluating academic integrity reflect epistemological assumptions deeply rooted in the Western philosophical tradition, including those of deductive/syllogistic and inductive reasoning, the correspondence theory of truth, the principle of non-contradiction and the ordering frames of Boolean logic. In contemporary terms, principles of academic integrity are also closely allied with forms of instrumental reason which legitimise intellectual property rights and the commodification of knowledge. Needless to say, the 'production of knowledge' is a process which can never be thought outside of the prevailing philosophical and cultural conditions in which it emerges. Given this limitation, it follows that there can be no strictly universal principles of academic integrity. This does not mean, however, that 'academic integrity' must always be viewed through the prism of a naive cultural relativism. Indeed, one way of responding to this problem is to acknowledge the validity of differing forms of reason as the basis for legitimising the production of knowledge in specific cultural contexts and across inter-semiotic domains of meaning.
The argument in this paper takes as its starting point the distinction made by Ruthrof (2004), between 'unitary reason' and the 'splitting of reason' (VernunftSpaltung). Extending this distinction, and relating it to systems of non-Western rationality, the discussion aims to broaden the perspectives available to educators when considering cultural constraints in the production of knowledge and concomitant implications for the evaluation of academic integrity. The analysis should also provoke debate about the challenges entailed in refining principles of academic integrity as inter-culturally meaningful tools enabling the production of knowledge(s) in a globalised academic milieu.
[Non-refereed full paper]
A student-centric approach to promote academic integrity
Raymond Singh
Singapore Management University
Email: raymondsingh@smu.edu.sg
This paper focuses on the role of students of Singapore Management University (SMU) in raising the awareness of academic integrity through active engagement between the University and representatives of the student community. A student organisation named the "Student Council of Discipline" (SCD) forms annually to collaborate with the University, via the University Council of Student Conduct (UCSC), to moderate student conduct matters. The foundation of the SCD lies upon the University's core values, or CIRCLE Values (Commitment, Integrity, Responsibility, Collegiality, Leadership and Excellence), which is used to inoculate their peers with a higher moral awareness, especially in the area of academic integrity. This paper discusses the background of general student conduct management in SMU, the objective principles behind the existing approach towards academic integrity vis-à-vis student engagement and values education, various initiatives throughout the years, and the outcomes and challenges faced. Lastly, this paper outlines plans to further student engagement and explores possible future developments.
Keywords: Academic integrity, CIRCLE values, SMU, Singapore Management University, Student Council of Discipline
Institutional training and the Australian code for the responsible conduct of research
Tes Toop
Deakin University
ttoop@deakin.edu.au
The Australian code for the responsible conduct of research (the Code, 2007) outlines institutional and researcher responsibility for a range of matters that fall into the good practice in research, or research integrity, domain. Chapter 3 of the Code outlines the responsibilities relating to the supervision of research trainees and here, as well as in Section 1.3 of Chapter 1, the requirement of institutions to provide induction and training in the responsible conduct of research is outlined. This presentation considers the experience of one university in meeting its responsibilities in training higher degree by research students and other research staff in research integrity. Furthermore, in considering the few face to face workshops we have carried out with higher degree by research students, interesting discussions have arisen about the greyer areas of good practice in research, which we term questionable research practices. These discussions lead to the consideration of how best to protect and advise students in their compliance with the Code when they may be under considerable alternative pressure from those in a power relationship with them (for example, in a supervisory relationship). The aim of this presentation is to stimulate discussion about how best to fulfil institutional obligations for training in good practice in research under the Code.
[Non-refereed full paper]
A tale of two cities: Implementing a developmental approach to academic integrity in two Australian universities
Craig Whitsed
Murdoch University
Douglas Colbeck
University of Tasmania
C.Whitsed@murdoch.edu.au, Doug.Colbeck@utas.edu.au
As Australian universities expand further into the global international student market and move to widen their participation pathways to realise the Bradley (2008) targets for increased participation in higher education, academic integrity is likely to come under increasing scrutiny. Recent AUQA audit reports have highlighted the need for Australian universities to ensure that their systems and management of academic quality are robust. Universities in Australia have therefore been forced to evaluate and in some cases reconsider their approaches to academic integrity. This paper reports on the activities of two Australian universities of similar size and composition and how they have responded to the increased challenge of maintaining flexible, robust and relevant policies and procedures to address academic misconduct. It is demonstrated that in both cases an underlying value steering their repositioning has been an emphasis placed on a developmental approach to academic integrity to foster 'the ethical student' by focusing attention on scaffolding students' understanding of the expectations and conventions of academic scholarship in their contexts. While both universities share similar goals they have embarked on two different strategies. This paper first outlines how University of Tasmania employed 'Turnitin' and an Academic Writing Module as an institution wide strategy aimed at assisting students to understand academic integrity by developing their academic skills. Second, in 2010 Murdoch University enacted a new raft of academic misconduct regulations and procedures including guidelines, frameworks, training for academic staff and instructional units for students, and a wider range of print and online resources focused on academic integrity. The aim of these initiatives is to demonstrate that Murdoch University not only has robust and transparent regulations, but also ensures fair, consistent, and most importantly a developmental approach toward promoting academic integrity.
[Refereed research paper]
Staff and student perspectives on the potential of honour codes in the UK
Nadya Yakovchuk
University of London
Jo Badge and Jon Scott
University of Leicester
n.yakovchuk@hotmail.co.uk, jlb34@leicester.ac.uk, js50@leicester.ac.uk
Honour code systems have been long-established in some American universities, associated with cultures of academic integrity. This study considers the perceptions of students and staff, elicited through focus groups and electronic voting, in one UK higher education institution regarding the potential for implementation of these systems in the UK. Whilst the main principles of honour codes were broadly welcomed, implementation in the UK higher education context was perceived as problematic. Although both staff and students saw educational benefits in increased student involvement in the promotion of academic integrity and good academic practice, there was a tension between staff who would like to increase the responsibilities of students and the reality of the students' seeming lack of confidence in their ability to discharge those responsibilities. The introduction of students as participants in plagiarism hearing panels and processes was tentatively supported, potentially offering a route to break down the staff-student dichotomy.
Keywords: academic integrity, plagiarism prevention, honour code, honor code, focus group
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Atkinson, R. J. & McBeath, C. (Eds) (2011). Educational integrity: Culture and values. Proceedings 5th Asia Pacific Conference on Educational Integrity. The University of Western Australia, 26-28 September. Publisher: The University of Western Australia and Asia Pacific Forum on Educational Integrity. URL: http://www.apcei.catl.uwa.edu.au/procs/Unless otherwise specified, the items listed in table of contents are refereed research full papers, non-refereed full papers, discussion-centred session pages, or abstracts, accepted on the basis of the peer review process or Committee review process specified in the Conference's Call for papers, http://www.apcei.catl.uwa.edu.au/call_for_papers
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