Westchester Community College Academic Honesty Policy

“Academic dishonesty is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.  Cheating, forgery, plagiarism, and collusion in dishonest acts undermine the college’s educational mission and the students’ personal and intellectual growth.  Westchester Community College students are expected to bear individual responsibility for their work and to uphold the ideal of academic integrity.  Any student who attempts to compromise or devalue the academic process will be sanctioned. 

Cheating harms the college community in many ways.  Honest students are frustrated by the unfairness of cheating that goes undetected and therefore unpunished.  Students who cheat skew the grading curve in a class, resulting in lower grades for students who worked hard and did their own work. 

Definition of Academic Dishonesty:

PLAGIARISM
Plagiarism is the act of presenting another person’s ideas, research, or writing as your own.  Examples include:

1. Copying another person’s actual words without both the use of quotations and documentation.

2. Presenting another person’s ideas or theories in your own words without documentation.

3. Using information that is not considered common knowledge without acknowledging the source.

4. Using a paper writing “service” or having a friend write the paper for you.

Note:  The guidelines that define plagiarism also apply to information secured on internet websites.  Internet references must specify precisely where the information was obtained and where it can be found. 

You may think that citing another author’s work will lower your grade.  In some unusual cases this may be true, if your instructor has indicated that you must write your paper without reading additional material.  But in fact, as you progress in your studies, you will be expected to show that you are familiar with important work in your field and can use this work to further your thinking.  Your professors write this kind of paper all the time.  The key to avoiding plagiarism is that you show clearly where your own thinking ends and someone else’s begins. 

CHEATING 
Cheating is the attempted or unauthorized use of materials, information, notes, study aids, devices or communication during an academic exercise.  Examples include:

Tests and Exams:

1. Copying from another student during an examination or allowing another to copy your work.

2. Using unauthorized notes during a closed book examination.

3. Using unauthorized devices during an examination.

4. Asking or allowing another student, or anyone else, to take an examination for you.

5. Changing a corrected exam and returning it for more credit.

6. Preparing answers or writing notes in a blue book (exam booklet) before an examination.

7. Taking an examination for another student.

8. Taking an examination or any examination material out of an examination room at any time without the expressed permission of the instructor who created that examination.”

Take Home Tests and Individual Assignments:

1. If tutors or others aid the student in the preparation of an assignment, the submitted assignment should represent the student’s current level of ability.

2. Unauthorized collaborating on a take home assignment or examination.

3. Submitting substantial portions of the same paper to two classes without consulting the second instructor.

4. Using a paper writing “service” or having someone else write the paper for you.

5. Preparing an essay or assignment, or allowing one’s essay or assignment to be copied by someone else.
6. Borrowing all or part of another student’s paper or using someone else’s outline to write your own paper.
7. Intentionally citing inaccurate or nonexistent source materials.

Collaborative (Group) Assignments:

1. Failure to acknowledge group members on homework and lab assignment.
2. Turning in another group members work as an example of your individual work.

Notes:  Group projects require careful division of responsibility and careful coordination to control the quality of the final product.  Group work calls for a different kind of effort, not less of it.  When group projects are assigned, the instructor is usually interested in the mastery of group process as well as the subject.  Ask the instructor to clarify individual responsibilities and suggest a method of proceeding. 

Labs:

1. In computer programming classes, borrowing computer code from another student and presenting it as your own.

2. Copying a lab report, or allowing someone else to copy one’s report.

3. Using another student’s data unless specifically allowed by the instructor.

4.  Allowing someone else to do the lab report.

5. Faking laboratory data.

ABUSE OF LIBRARY PRIVILEGES
Any attempt to deprive others of equal access to library resources constitutes a violation of academic integrity.  This includes the hiding or deliberately misshelving of library books for the use of an individual or group, a repeated failure to respond to recall notices and the removal or attempt to remove library materials from the college library without authorization. Defacing, stealing or destroying books, articles or other library materials meant to serve the entire college community also constitutes a violation of academic integrity.

Consequences of Academic Dishonesty:
If a student is found guilty of academic dishonesty, faculty members have the right to either: 

1. Fail the student for the assignment/test.

2. Fail the student for the course.

3. File a letter of complaint, describing the infraction, with the Associate Dean of Student Personnel Services.

or any combination of the above. 

A second reported infraction may result in suspension.  A third reported infraction may result in expulsion at the discretion of the Vice President and Dean, Student Personnel Services. “