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Promoting academic integrity

All members of the University community are entrusted with the responsibility of observing certain ethical goals and values as they relate to academic integrity. Essential to the fundamental purpose of the University is the commitment to the principles of truth and honesty. Responsibility for upholding these principles lies with the individual as well as the entire community.

DU Honor Code & Academic Misconduct

During the 2009-10 academic year, the Provost charged a group of faculty, staff, administrators, and students to evaluate how well the honor code is working to promote a universal commitment to academic honesty and integrity. According to the revised Honor Code, Student Academic Misconduct is defined as:

Plagiarism, including any representation of another's work or ideas as one's own in academic & educational submissions
Cheating, including any actual or attempted use of resources not authorized by the instructor(s) for academic submissions
Fabrication, including any falsification or creation of data, research or resources to support academic submissions.

Resources for Instructors

Helping to Ensure Honesty In the Classroom - Office of Student Conduct (OSC) is responsible for addressing violations of Student Conduct Policies, including Academic Misconduct. Visit this page to access a sample Honor Code statement for your syllabus, faculty information sheet, incident report for reporting alleged incidents of academic misconduct, and related resources.

Honor Code Portfolio - Visit the Honor Code Portfolio to view a six-minute video of Buie Seawell talking to faculty about how to promote academic integrity in the classroom as well as other resources for DU faculty members.

How to Avoid Plagiarism - This is an excellent resource developed by DU Writing instructors that outlines strategies for designing writing assignments that address issues of plagiarism.

SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention service available within Blackboard. A SafeAssign Originality Report highlights any blocks of text in submitted documents that match reference sources, and links back to the matching documents on the Internet or in supported content databases. The OTL recommends using "Safe Assignments" to educate students about plagiarism and the importance of proper attribution of any borrowed content.

Academic Integrity Quiz - This is a short quiz created by OSC that can be imported into your Blackboard course. This is a ten question multiple choice and true/false quiz that can be used as a tool to educate your students about the DU Honor Code and Academic Integrity. Contact Kathy Keairns at x14156 or email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it to request a copy of the quiz for your course.

External Articles & Resources

Plagiarism Deterred Through Information, Not Threats

Plagiarism Online: A bibliography for composition and rhetoric