- RESOLVED:
That the School of Computer Science and Engineering strongly encourages use
laboratory programming examinations and/or other alternative assessment
methods, as hurdles to prevent
people without appropriate programming skills from passing those
courses.
Where feasible, examination questions should be included that
test understanding of assignment material.
- RESOLVED:
That the School of Computer Science and Engineering shall provide a
clear definition of plagiarism as opposed to acceptable cooperation.
This definition should be available
- as part of the yellow form,
- separately as a School Plagiarism Policy web page, and
- linked to each course web page, as part of the course introductory
information.
Where aspects of the School Policy are inappropriate (as might occur
in course with group project rules or other cooperation rules), the
course web page and introductory handout shall detail the differences.
The language used in communicating plagiarism rules to students shall
be "matter-of-fact" rather than threatening.
- RESOLVED:
That the School should establish a plagiarism working group, including
interested staff, postgraduate students, and COMPSOC representation,
to try to ensure that the plagiarism detection methods in use in the
School are as strong as possible.
- RESOLVED:
Lecturers may impose a penalty of 0 FL on any recipient of a substantially
copied or purchased
assignment and a penalty of loss of all marks for the assignment for
a complicit originator. Lecturers shall have discretion as to whether to apply
the full penalty. If they do not apply the standard penalty, they may
apply a lesser penalty, or they may reprimand the student.
The remaining parts of this resolution are to assist staff in interpreting
the plagiarism policy, and will not be published to students.
The term "substantially copied" is defined, for the purpose of this
resolution, to mean that a significant proportion of the assignment
is copied. It would not apply to copying of a single, small function,
unless in the lecturer's judgment that function was the core of the
assignment. It would certainly apply to an assignment of which 80%
or more was copied. Intermediate cases lie within the lecturer's
discretion.
The basis of the School's Plagiarism Policy is that the intention of
assignments and other set works is to ensure that the student learns
certain facts and skills. The penalisation of plagiarism is to be
seen against this background, and cases where students copy but
understand the material that they copied are to be seen as less
serious than cases where the student does not understand the copied
material. It is likely however that an "understanding" copier will
not have fully learned the skills involved in producing the copied
code.
- RESOLVED:
That the School of Computer Science and Engineering shall implement a
central database of persons penalised or reprimanded for plagiarism. The
database shall record details of course, session, lecturer,
originator(s) and recipient(s). This database shall not be
available to academic staff, but shall be managed by the School
Student Office. The protocol for its use shall be that
when a new, complete record of plagiarism for a student is entered into
the database, previous records for the same student(s) shall be retrieved.
This database shall be maintained for 4 years and then reviewed.
Students shall have access to their own record (if any) in such a
database, on request, and a right to have proven errors of fact in
their record corrected. If such errors of fact meant that a previously
applied penalty was inappropriate, then the penalty shall be reviewed.
If errors of fact meant that there was no plagiarism, then the record
shall be expunged.
Remark (not part of resolution): the aim is now to determine
the numbers of multiple offenders against plagiarism rules. While the
resolution as passed no longer requires full details of offences to be
kept in the School database, it would be unwise for lecturers not to
retain the evidence on which they based their penalties.
- REJECTED UNANIMOUSLY:
That the School of Computer Science and Engineering shall not
normally employ as a casual academic, a person who has been
recorded in the School plagiarism database as having been
penalised as the originator or recipient of an assignment. Note
that students reprimanded rather than penalised may be employed.
This rule may be set aside in an individual case by the Associate
Head of School or another person designated by the Head of School.
This might occur, for example, if a student who was convicted once in
first year and who subsequently had a superlative academic record with
no further breaches of plagiarism rules, applied to tutor in their
fourth year.
- CONSIDERATION OF THIS MOTION WAS DEFERRED:
That members of the School of Computer Science and Engineering shall
apply the following constraints when investigating suspected plagiarism
offences:
- If students are interviewed, there shall be more than one staff
member present at the interview, and a record of the interview
shall be made, and a copy provided to the student. The student
must sign to acknowledge that they have received the copy. If
they refuse to accept a copy or to sign, the staff members
attending the interview shall state this in the record of
interview. The staff members attending the interview shall sign
the record of interview.
- In conducting an interview with a suspected plagiarist, members
of the interview panel shall not use intimidatory techniques or
intimidatory language. It is legitimate to confront students with
conflicting statements that they have made, or with a conflict
between their statement(s) and their submitted material, or with
a conflict between statement(s) that they have made and statement(s)
that another involved student has made.
- CONSIDERATION OF THIS MOTION WAS DEFERRED:
That the School of Computer Science and Engineering shall permit
students found to have committed a plagiarism offence to appeal
against the conviction or the severity of the penalty, under the
following conditions:
- The student shall appeal in writing, stating the nature of the
appeal (conviction or severity of penalty) and the grounds of the
appeal.
- The initial avenue of appeal shall be to the lecturer-in-charge
of the course. If the matter is not satisfactorily resolved, the
student may appeal to the School Grievance Officer.
- If the appeal is upheld, the plagiarism penalty and the plagiarism
record shall be amended.
- An appeal shall be deemed frivolous if no relevant extra material
is produced in connection with the appeal document, or if the
relevant extra material could reasonably have been produced in
the original consideration of the plagiarism offence. Neither the
fact of conviction nor the severity of the penalty shall be varied
in the case of a frivolous appeal.
- Appeals shall be recorded in the record in the plagiarism database
together with the outcome of the appeal, factors relevant to the
outcome, and in particular whether or not the appeal was deemed
frivolous.
- An academic, being the Lecturer-in-Charge, the student's Program
Director, School Grievance Officer, or Head of School, may instigate
a review of a plagiarism case on becoming aware of new facts in
relation to that case. The review would be conducted by the original
panel, supplemented by the academic instigating the review if s/he
wishes to be involved.