04.24 Academic Integrity

For that reason, honesty and integrity sit alongside humility, courage, empathy, fairmindedness, evidence-based argument, simplicity and conviction as intellectual virtues. This work also takes place within a “fellowship of research and study”, in which we learn from the prior work of others and in turn respect and acknowledge their intellectual labour. Most importantly, our research, writing and speaking are all done in the presence of God who sees and knows all things, including the intentions of the heart.

The academic rules and regulations against plagiarism are designed to protect intellectual property, i.e. to keep one person from passing off another person’s work as their own (either for academic credit or financial advantage). These rules have been in place in most institutions of higher education for centuries. When you use another person’s work, make use of their ideas, arguments or conclusions, and especially when you use their express words, you must acknowledge this (usually with a footnote and, in the case of a direct quotation, quotation marks as well). It does not ultimately matter whether the unattributed use of another’s work is intentional or unintentional.

There have always been “grey areas”, for instance when the material concerned is a fact generally known, or when an idea, turn of phrase, or line of argument has become commonplace and is used so regularly that attribution is pointless. Do you need to mention Martin Noth every time you use the word “Deuteronomist”? Do you need to cite Melanchthon whenever you mention sola gratia and sola fide? Do you need to footnote the first person to establish the date for the destruction of Herod’s Temple? The picture is complicated by those turns of phrase and lines of argument which you learnt from your teachers, perhaps long ago, and which have now become part and parcel of your own perspective and intellectual equipment without you ever realising this has happened. Must we become neurotic about whether every thought, idea, argument or mode of expression is original? No, but we must be careful. When in doubt, provide the citation.

When it comes to making decisions about grey areas and unintentional plagiarism, generally common sense fair dealing interpretations of the rules and regulations are applied by those administering them. However, at least three factors have combined to contribute to a significantly increased sensitivity to the issue in recent years.

1 The globalisation of education: In some cultures, education largely consists in memorising what has been said to you by your teachers. Students rote learn and assessment involves regurgitation of material. In fact, you honour your teachers by repeating their words rather than finding your own. Such an educational environment is very different to that which has been dominant in most Western higher educational institutions for centuries. This has sometimes meant that those who travel from one context to another have difficulty in understanding the concept of plagiarism and believe they are doing the right thing when they cite without attribution. Such travel has been made much easier over the past fifty years and so explicit warnings about plagiarism and a description of what is meant by that term now routinely feature on the websites of universities and colleges all around the world.

 2 The computerisation of education: The impact of computers in this area is twofold. First, the cut and paste functions of computers have facilitated the easy incorporation of sections of one text into another. It is easy when cutting and pasting to forget or to postpone footnoting the source and this can lead to trouble. The second impact has been the advent of plagiarism software such as Turnitin™, which Moore College uses. This software can be used to identifies where there is significant commonality between two or more pieces of work. The results may still need to be interpreted, but it is much easier to spot a prima facie case of plagiarism Turnitin now also produces a report showing a percentage likelihood of Artificial Intelligence being used to produce an assignment or a portion of an assignment.

 3 The new litigious character of education: In keeping with a growing concern to protect intellectual property rights more generally (e.g. a spate of recent lawsuits in the popular music industry), higher education institutions and publishing houses are very wary of the risk of litigation, whether from authors who believe their material has been used by others without attribution or from those who have relied upon work which they now believe to have been plagiarised.

Moore College is not immune to these developments. Our concern must be to act with the utmost integrity in all our academic endeavours and to take seriously our responsibility to the sources which we use in the work we do. To this end, Moore College is using plagiarism detection software.