Photo courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons/ Brian Turner
The following reports are real cases adjudicated by the Emory College Honor Council. Any personally identifiable information has been omitted to protect the privacy of all parties involved.
- A junior in a lower level science course was found guilty of seeking unauthorized assistance on a take home exam. Students were not allowed to use outside sources once they began the exam. When grading the student’s work, the professor noted changes in the font and font size that matched the review sheets for the course. It appeared that passages had been cut-and-pasted into the student’s exam and then reworded. The student admitted that he wanted a higher grade and consulted the study guides as he took the exam. The Honor Council recommended an F in the course and a 2-year mark on the student’s personal record.
- A freshman in a lower level humanities course was found guilty of plagiarism on a series of journal entries. Some of the language sounded a bit technical, and the professor found that portions of the journal entries were copied verbatim without any references or quotation marks. The student acknowledged responsibility for plagiarizing. The Honor Council recommended an F in the course and a 2-year mark on the student’s personal record.
- A junior in an upper level social science course was found guilty of plagiarism and providing unauthorized assistance on some written assignments. The professor noted that long passages appeared to have been plagiarized in the student’s work. The student admitted to plagiarism, noting that she had faced some personal challenges that semester. She also admitted to the Honor Council that she had plagiarized an essay for a friend in the class, which she submitted on behalf of her friend. The Honor Council recommended an F in the course and a 4-year mark on the student’s personal record.
— Compiled by Brandon Fuhr
