Faculty of Economics & Business
Centre to Advance Learning in Economics & Business (CALEB)
ACADEMIC HONESTY MODULE
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The Centre to Advance Learning in Economics & Business (CALEB) within the Faculty of
Economics & Business, has developed an online Academic Honesty module on the Faculty’s
Blackboard platform, which all new students must complete before their first assignment is due.
The Faculty-wide assignment coversheet template has a box which students must tick: “I have
completed the online academic honesty module”. The module is available at any time for
students to return to, should they wish to check an aspect of academic honesty.
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Under the auspices of CALEB, the module was developed by Dr Henriikka Clarkeburn,
Lecturer in ethics and politics at the School of Economics & Political Science. The aim of the
module is to educate the students in academic honesty. The module was trialled last year, and
received very positive feedback from students.
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The module has 8 sections,
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Plagiarism – what is it really?
Plagiarism – avoiding it by proper referencing - includes web links
Plagiarism – avoiding it by knowing what to reference
Plagiarism – avoiding it with acceptable paraphrasing?
Acceptable collaboration and group work versus collusion and free riding
Other forms of academic honesty (tests, exams, data fabrication)
Detecting and dealing with academic dishonesty (administrative issues)
Quick feedback on this module (e.g. what is the most important thing you learnt,
any suggestions to improve the site? etc.)
Each of these (except for no.8: evaluation), has an interactive component which involves a self-test.
The 30 self-test questions include o A what would you do in this situation? dilemma – students provide short answer (the aim here
is to raise students’ awareness by asking them to think about an academic honesty issue)
o Various descriptions of students’ writing methods - students choose which one(s) constitutes
plagiarism and which is/are acceptable
o Following an example of a breach, students are asked: Do you consider this to be a serious
breach of academic honesty? They choose from a 6-point scale: Very serious – Not at all
serious.
Students receive a score for some of the self-test questions, and can check the correct answers for
any they answered incorrectly. There are also ‘tips’ following most sections.
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The site takes about half an hour for students to complete, though may take longer if they visit
all the weblinks available.
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As the students log on to the module by using their SID, it is possible for the Faculty to check if
they have done the module or not. (There is no plan at present to chase up those who have not
and yet tick the ‘completed module’ box.)
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Students are able to use software ‘Safe Assignment’ on Blackboard to check their drafts of
assignments for plagiarism. Academic staff can also use this tool to check students’ assignments. (TurnItIn software was trialled, but legal problems were encountered because of the
requirement that students’ work entered a bank of material compiled by TurnItIn.)
Diana Montgomery d.montgomery@econ.usyd.edu.au
Student Learning Advisor