Unethical academic submissions on the rise in higher education institutions

Concern around the dishonesty of academic work submitted by students continues to loom in higher education institutions.

The transition to virtual learning owing to the pandemic led to more opportunity for students to submit work that is not fully theirs.

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Dean: Academic Support and Development at The Independent Institute of Education, Dr Gillian Mooney said there are different reasons students are dishonest with their work, and there are different types of dishonest work.

‘These include cheating, plagiarism, and referencing issues,’ she said.

Mooney said cheating websites have been around for a long time, and in some instances people make money from doing work for students.

Here are the types of dishonest academic work:

CHEATING: Collaborating on assignments with others when you were tasked to do the work on your own, copying work or ideas from other students, helping someone cheat by sharing your work with them, downloading questions or assignments from the internet, and paying someone to complete your coursework, are examples of cheating, says Dr Mooney.

PLAGIARISM: Paraphrasing, i.e. using key points from different sources and rewriting them as if they are your own, copying and pasting pieces of different text to create a new text, rewording or changing some words in sourced material, obscure sourcing to hide the actual source material, weak citation, and therefore not properly acknowledging the work was sourced from elsewhere, are examples of plagiarism, Dr Mooney explains.

REFERENCING: Proper referencing is vital and requires students to consistently use the same referencing format, adhere to technical correctness and follow academic conventions, and ensure references in the text match with the bibliography/reference list. ‘Proper referencing is important because students join an academic community and they need to learn the rules of that community. It is, therefore, worth the effort to focus on getting your referencing on point right from the start,’ says Dr Mooney.
‘Students should ensure they have a good understanding of what constitutes academic integrity so they don’t inadvertently submit questionable work,’ she explained.
‘Additionally, it must be understood that plagiarism is not a victimless crime, and that the most likely victims are the plagiarising students themselves – whether the impact is immediate in terms of sanction by their institution, or delayed as they enter the workplace unprepared.
‘However, the most important consequence is for the person who engages in academic dishonesty. It really means engaging in unethical behaviour. The question is, would you steal a cellphone? Would you cheat on your partner?
‘The point is that academic honesty needs to be part of your everyday engagement with the world. Furthermore, the credibility of their qualification could be jeopardised if their institution gains a reputation for being lax in enforcing academic integrity policies,’ says Mooney.
Mooney says it is the responsibility of the institution to ensure the credibility of students’ qualifications by ensuring dishonest and unethical academic work policies are in place.