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What is Academic Dishonesty?

Using someone else's words, work and/or ideas and claiming them as your own. That sounds straight forward enough, but students are sometimes confused when using and referencing someone else's material. Parents can be helpful in clearing up the confusion.

"Parents have the most important role in limiting cheating and plagiarism."
-Michael Josephson, founder and president of the Josephson Institute of Ethics

Parents, typically, are the most important role model in a child's life. If a parent is aware of cheating or plagiarism and does nothing about it, that is sending a clear message to the student that cheating is OK.

See statistics regarding academic dishonesty.

Examples of Academic Dishonesty

• Hiring someone to write a paper
• Buying a paper or project (this is plagiarism)
• Sharing files in a business class
• Copying math homework
• Building on someone else's ideas without proper citations (this is also plagiarism)
• Turning in someone else's journal (plagiarism again)
• Letting your science lab partner do all the work and putting your name on the final report
• Letting parents complete a project for you.

"...parents [need ] to be vigilant, informed and involved."
-Michael Josephson

Vigilance:
Parents should know that students are not inclined to report truthfully about cheating at school. Take it upon yourself to ask questions that will encourage discussion. Don't give the impression it's "no big deal". Left ignored there are long-term consequences that will have widespread impact. Parents are often unaware of the prevalence of cheating.
As much as 70% of high school students have cheated.

Informed:
This is particularly important if you have Internet access at home. There are plenty of sites that students may access for research papers/projects. Check out some on your own at the staff page. Discuss them with your child.

Involved:
It's important to recognize that school is your child's job. There are myriad opportunities at Churchill for parents to get involved. Teachers and administrators are fully aware of the importance of a school-parent partnership and attempt to promote the relationship. By getting involved you become aware of issues at school and can make these topics of discussion with your child. Discussion should be open and two-way and should not create pressure in your child's life.

What are some other things parents can do to address this issue?

What are the long-term consequences of this type of behavior?
Our children are our future politicians business owners and professionals. Want kind of future will be established if it is based on false achievements? Check out this story about a news reporter who made up award winning news stories - Too Good to Check. This, unfortunately reflects a growing trend in our society. As parents and educators we may look the other way or take it up as our responsibility to help our youth develop confidence in their ability to think on their own.

Statistics
Survey results show a disparity between parents' sense of student cheating and the reality:

• 70% of all high school students cheated on a test (Survey by Michael Josephson)
• 40% of high school students in academically top 5% cheated on a test.
• high school cheating/copying jumped from 58% to 97% from 1969 to 1989
• 80% of college-bound students admit to cheating; 95% don't get caught
• between 15-25% of high school and college students report using the Web to cheat

What do parents say about cheating?

• 63% said their child never cheated.
• 47% tell their child they should not cheat.
• 34% "never talked about it'
• 16% forbid cheating.

  Most data from a survey done with students listed in Who's Who Among American High School Students and their parents by Paul C. Krouse.

A Last Note: It is important that teachers discuss what academic dishonesty means within their own classroom. It will vary from teacher to teacher and subject to subject. If your son or daughter is not certain what are the rules, it is important for them to ask.

Most examples of cheating are black and white. However, there may be some cases where it is harder to determine. For example, Is it okay to form study groups and share notes, ask each other questions? Some teachers may prohibit study groups and others say study groups are fine. That is why it's important to ask if it is not clear.