Advice for Faculty
Fostering Academic Integrity
in Online Courses
Larry MacPhee, CTEL
Joyce Kincannon, CTEL
Wally Nolan, CTEL
3 General Questions
 Is cheating inevitable?
 Why do students cheat?
 Why is it my problem?
Why do they do it?
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Easy to get away with
Insufficient time
A friend needed help
Passing grade is vital
Everyone else is doing it
Nobody cares if I cheat
Course is too hard
Teacher is unfair
Course is useless.
Is this my problem?
 Credibility is at stake


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of the Instructor
of the Course
of the Program
of the Institution
 Student morale is at stake.
5 Course Design Elements
• Syllabus Design
• Content Delivery
• Student-Instructor Relationship
• Assessment Design
• Monitoring Tools
1. Syllabus Design
• Clearly define course objectives
• Define inappropriate behavior
• Specify consequences
• Link to institutional policies
• Warn students of monitoring tools
• Discuss relevance of course
• Establish deadlines
• Clearly define course policies.
2. Content Delivery
• Change assignments each semester
• Know your audience
• Required vs. supplemental info
• Tell students what is important
• Design assignments for the web.
• Link to resource pages
• Keep audio & video clips short
• Avoid PowerPoint
• Use student prompts
• Lean and rich, not flashy and fluffy
• Offline learning is ok.
3. Good Communication
• Offer frequent reminders
• Respond promptly to questions
• Build a respectful relationship
• Encourage student collaboration
• Monitor student communication
• Moderate discussions.
4. Assessment Design
• Randomize questions and answers
• Use large question banks, multiple versions
• Set short time windows for objective tests
• Proctor objective tests in labs
• Thwart paper mills like “SchoolSucks.com”
• Spread points across many assignments
• Consider use of “honor statements”
• Assume student access to all resources
• Investigate suspicious activity.
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5. Monitoring Tools
• Enroll a “mole” in your class discussions
• Look for same wrong answer patterns
• Check test start and end times
• Check test takers’ IP addresses
• Interview suspects sequentially
• Track student scores during the course
• Look at grade distributions over semesters
• Use comparison tools like “TurnItIn.com”
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New Technologies
Google, Encarta, WiFi, IM, cell phones, OCR
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Additional Resources
Software Secure
Duke University’s Center for Academic Integrity
Designing Online Courses to Discourage
Dishonesty by Barbara Christe
30 seconds to a Darwin Biography
(courtesy Encarta.com)