How is academic misconduct approached at SMCM?
SMCM recognizes that mistakes in judgment may be an opportunity for development and growth in the college experience. As such, the procedures and policies around academic misconduct at SMCM have room for second chances, and also work to apply sanctions incrementally based on the frequency and severity of the misconduct. All of this depends on the instructor’s commitment to document and report all instances of misconduct, so that the College may ensure any chronic issues of academic dishonesty are tracked and addressed.
These are the College’s Judicial Procedures for Academic Misconduct, as included in the Student Handbook, To the Point. This outlines all definitions of academic dishonesty, procedures and policies, students’ rights and responsibilities, etc. Instructors need to determine if the activity meets the college’s standards of academic misconduct.
NEW in 2023-2024: The definition of cheating has been updated to indicate that use of artificial intelligence by a student in a course where it has been explicitly prohibited by the instructor (in the syllabus) is considered a form of cheating.
While faculty are obliged to report any cases of misconduct, there is considerable leeway in addressing the incident. An in-course penalty may range from a verbal warning to failing the course. For more complex matters (multiple students involved in cheating, a strongly-contested incident for which the instructor feels certain the student is responsible), the instructor may opt to request a hearing by the Academic Judicial Board (AJB). At any point, please feel welcome to consult with the Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs, who can be reached at 240-895-4922.
What steps do I take to handle misconduct?
There are three broad steps to the process:
- Documenting the misconduct
- Meeting with the student
- Submitting the incident report
Documenting the misconduct
- Gather all evidence to support the allegation, such as scans/photocopies of similar exam answers, screenshots, providing excerpts from original documents that have been copied, etc.
- To the extent possible, please explain and notate the misconduct as clearly as possible for internal records and/or for the committee who may need to evaluate it. Instead of writing, “Student plagiarized passages of XYZ article,” take the added step of providing the journal article and highlighting the passages you’re referencing in each document.
- Prepare the Academic Misconduct Reporting Form. Broadly speaking, it’s the instructor’s prerogative to initially decide the following, to be noted on the incident report:
- whether this constitutes minor or major academic misconduct (note this is a fairly subjective discernment, and does not have a direct bearing on how possible sanctions will be applied);
- whether to treat the incident as an “in-course penalty” (sanctions determined by the instructor and only applicable within the course) or to request an AJB hearing (finding of “responsible/not responsible” determined by AJB)
- NB: regardless of the instructor’s request to apply an in-course penalty, if the student is found to have previous academic misconduct on file, the incident will automatically be forwarded to the AJB for a hearing.
- a *recommended* sanction. The AJB or the Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs may opt to diverge from the faculty member’s recommended sanction for the following reasons:
- if the student is found not responsible by the AJB, all records of the incident will automatically be deleted from college records.
- if the proposed sanction is deemed to be out of alignment with the violation, the AJB may recommend a more suitable penalty. The Associate Vice President will discuss this with the instructor to find an appropriate compromise.
- if the student has been found responsible in previous incidents of academic misconduct. If, in the present case, the AJB finds the student responsible, the Office of the Associate Vice President will inform the AJB of any previous sanctions for misconduct in incidents for which they have been held responsible. In those situations, the AJB may suggest more stringent sanctions than what had been suggested by the instructor.
Notifying the Student
Once the evidence has been gathered and the report has been prepared, but NOT submitted to the Office of the Vice President for Academic Affairs, the instructor must notify the student.
Faculty are encouraged to meet with the student to make this notification; at the meeting, the student is provided with a copy of the incident report and evidence (to keep). Faculty are invited to consult with the Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs if they need advice in how to initiate and/or facilitate this conversation with the student.
If the student is notified in writing, it may be by certified mail or by email IF the faculty member labels it “highest priority” and turns on the “notification” option so when it is opened, the sender is notified.
Submitting the Report
Following the notification, the report is officially submitted to the Office of the Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs. There are two ways to submit a report this year.
Option 1: Use the traditional form-based process, if the faculty member has already prepared multiple copies of the Reporting form and related evidence that can be forwarded as an email to the Associate VP of Academic Affairs, Katy Arnett (kearnett@smcm.edu). Materials that are submitted using this process will be transferred to the Maxient portal by the Office of the Associate Vice President.
Option 2: Submit directly to the Maxient portal once you’ve spoken with the student about the situation. The questions at the Maxient portal directly mirror what is on the paper form. Attachments up to 5GB can be included in the submission, though it may take a while to fully upload. IMPORTANT: At the bottom of the form, BEFORE YOU CLICK SUBMIT, check the small box “Email me a copy of this form” to receive the copy of your answers and materials if you want to have a confirmation of your submission.
Who can I discuss this with?
IMPORTANT: This is a rare incident in which FERPA does *not* cover our internal college rules of “Legitimate Educational Interest.” That is, information regarding the names of those involved in cases of academic misconduct may not be divulged to other instructors, to the student’s academic advisor or coach, to the department chair, or anyone not immediately involved in the incident OTHER THAN the Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs and, via the Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs, the members of the AJB. Colleagues are free to discuss the circumstances of a possible violation for the purposes of seeking advice as long as no identifying information is exchanged.