Perspectives on Academic Integrity Cases and Implications for Fostering Ethical Decision Making Ellen L. Landgraf, PhD., CPA, Associate Professor Loyola.

Perspectives on Academic Integrity

Cases and Implications for Fostering Ethical Decision Making

Ellen L. Landgraf, PhD., CPA, Associate ProfessorLoyola University Chicago

[email protected]

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An Unexpected Find

Students were to submit “Writing Assignments” via Blackboard. There is no expectation that students will not discuss these assignments with each other, yet they are explicitly told to submit their own assignment. While answering e-mails, the instructor encounters the following:

Dear Professor Wonderful,My Writing Assignment #2 is attached is attached-I hope that it is ok that I e-mailed it to you instead of submitting it on Blackboard.John Doe

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An Unexpected Find (Cont.)

The professor proceeds to open the attachment (making a mental note to stress once again to students (even though it is clearly indicated on the syllabus) that these assignments are to be submitted via Blackboard.

While printing up the attachment an information box pops up-

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An Unexpected Find (Cont.)

Now printing Mary_Smith.doc…..

The professor then views Mary Smith’s submission on Blackboard – it is exactly the same as John Doe’s.

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The Fraud Triangle

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An Unexpected Find (Discussion)

What would you do?

What implications does technology have for academic integrity issues?

Does your school’s academic integrity policy cover this?

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Later that semester…

Professor Wonderful has to attend a meeting of the Ethics Committee of her State CPA society and has arranged to have her Mid-Term Exam proctored.

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The First Mid-Term

She has taken the following precautions:

2 versions of the exam have been prepared and numbered-they are to be distributed even/odd.

Multiple choice questions are the same yet the responses have been reordered on the two versions.

For the one problem requiring computations, the numbers have been changed dramatically.

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The First Mid-Term (Cont.)

In grading the exam, she finds that one student has given all of the correct answers to the wrong version of the exam on one particular page. This page contains the problem which requires simple calculations and then conclusions based on those computations. Certainly she is mistaken and doubles back-

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The First Mid-Term (Cont.)

No-she is correct- the student (John Doe) has in fact supplied the

correct computational answers to the version of the exam that he did not have. His exam was #17.

She then checked exam #18 (same page) –to her amazement it contained the exact same computational answers as exam #17 (as well as conclusions) and belonged to Mary Smith.

Mary’s computational answers were correct for the version of the exam she had taken.

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The First Mid-Term-Discussion

What would you do?

Does your school’s academic integrity policy cover this?

What should happen to John? Mary?

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Summary of IssuesPotential Discussion Points

Prevalence of “cheating” as part of culture-in business, academia, sports, politics

Do students rationalize academic dishonesty or do they “just not know” what is wrong?

What new issues in academic integrity are raised by the internet and technology?

Do we ignore the situation? Do students perceive that we do?

Are faculty equipped to deal with academic integrity issues?

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Enhancing Academic Integrity Potential Discussion Points

Are Honor Codes, Ethics Exams effective? Best Practices Preventative/detective controls

?