IB Academic Honesty Policy
Rationale for Academic Honesty
Our Elgin High School community values:
Likewise, each Diploma Program candidate and Diploma Course student at Elgin High School is expected to ensure his or her own submissions are solely their original ideas and products and are the result of each candidate’s honest efforts to reflect the highest academic integrity. Students are expected to engage in academic honesty in both classroom experiences and on assessments or examination experiences.
Who is Responsible for Academic Honesty?
Academic Honesty is best upheld when all stakeholders are invested in developing and adhering to practices and expectations that ensure the integrity of learning and assessment for all students. This means all classroom teachers, students, and parents have a role to play in cultivating a culture of academic honesty across Elgin High School. This includes:
Parents and students can find more information from IB regarding Academic Honesty by scanning this QR code.
What is Academic Misconduct?
The IB Organization and Elgin High School define academic misconduct as behavior that results in or may result in, any of the following:
Students should understand, that while Elgin High School staff will carefully instruct students on proper academic procedures and expectations, it is up to students to adhere to those guidelines. Any IB candidates who engage in any academic misconduct could see a cancelation of their IB subject scores or their IB candidacy altogether.
What does Academic Honesty Look Like?
Sometimes concepts like academic integrity, or academic honesty, are talked about through a very limited lens. Students and parents alike should be aware of the full scope of what it means for students to engage in their studies with appropriate habits that demonstrate the highest degree of academic honesty.
Our Elgin High School community values:
- Academic achievement, support for success, and respect for the educational process through individual integrity, responsibility, work ethic, and pride.
- Personal, positive relationships through mutual respect, clear and consistent communication, and the celebration of our diversity and talents.
- Collaborative teamwork as well as the development of role models and leaders at all levels.
Likewise, each Diploma Program candidate and Diploma Course student at Elgin High School is expected to ensure his or her own submissions are solely their original ideas and products and are the result of each candidate’s honest efforts to reflect the highest academic integrity. Students are expected to engage in academic honesty in both classroom experiences and on assessments or examination experiences.
Who is Responsible for Academic Honesty?
Academic Honesty is best upheld when all stakeholders are invested in developing and adhering to practices and expectations that ensure the integrity of learning and assessment for all students. This means all classroom teachers, students, and parents have a role to play in cultivating a culture of academic honesty across Elgin High School. This includes:
- Classroom teachers are expected to minimize the opportunities for students to partake in collusion, misconduct, or academic dishonesty. These actions include, but are not limited to, making sure no student has a smartphone/device on their person during an in-class assessment, placing desks far enough apart so students can not read each others’ answers, differentiating homework assignments so students are less inclined to copy others’ assignments, and varying/changing assessments and labs from year to year or class to class, and being vigilant while the assessment is taking place.
- Students are expected to have a working understanding of the Elgin High School academic honesty policy for the duration of their school experience in the building. Students are expected to adhere to the specific citation and source review procedures for each class they are enrolled in. Students should also report any concerns related to incidences of academic dishonesty to their classroom instructor so that the situation can be appropriately addressed.
- Parents are to review the Elgin High School academic policy with their students at the beginning of each academic year. Parents can support students in developing good habits pertaining to academic honesty by helping students develop a plan for sustained assignments, supporting them with scheduling work and obligations in order to complete the assignment in a timely manner, and encouraging students to reach out to their teachers for assistance with any work of which they may be struggling.
Parents and students can find more information from IB regarding Academic Honesty by scanning this QR code.
What is Academic Misconduct?
The IB Organization and Elgin High School define academic misconduct as behavior that results in or may result in, any of the following:
- The student or any other student gaining an unfair advantage in one or more components of assessment.
- Behavior that may disadvantage another student is also regarded as academic misconduct.
- Academic misconduct is a breach of these regulations and includes, but is not restricted to, the following:
- Plagiarism—this is defined as the representation, intentionally or unintentionally, of the ideas, words or work of another person without proper, clear and explicit acknowledgment.
- Collusion—this is defined as supporting academic misconduct by another student, for example, allowing one’s work to be copied or submitted for assessment by another.
- Duplication of work—this is defined as the presentation of the same work for different assessment components and/or DP core requirements.
- Misconduct during an IB examination (for example, taking unauthorized material into an examination, behavior that disrupts the examination or distracts other students, or communicating with another student).
- Any other behavior that gains an unfair advantage for a student or that affects the results of another student (for example, falsifying a CAS record, disclosure of information to and receipt of information from students about the content of an examination paper within 24 hours after a written examination via any form of communication/media).
Students should understand, that while Elgin High School staff will carefully instruct students on proper academic procedures and expectations, it is up to students to adhere to those guidelines. Any IB candidates who engage in any academic misconduct could see a cancelation of their IB subject scores or their IB candidacy altogether.
What does Academic Honesty Look Like?
Sometimes concepts like academic integrity, or academic honesty, are talked about through a very limited lens. Students and parents alike should be aware of the full scope of what it means for students to engage in their studies with appropriate habits that demonstrate the highest degree of academic honesty.
Student behaviors that demonstrate practices of
academic honesty I. A student reviews and makes adjustments as needed to all submitted papers, oral presentations, or demonstrations to ensure these largely consist of the student’s own original analysis, evaluation, or synthesis of that information on the topic.
II. Students working in a group all play a relatively equal part in developing both ideas and the final product in line with the aim of the group assignment.
III. A student uses proper citations, as indicated by the course instructor, for information that is directly quoted or paraphrased within a student’s work.
IV. A student who submits all of his/her own original ideas for work assigned by the teacher. OR A student who does not allow peers to copy from their own work.
V. During the IB Examination, a student adheres to all expectations of conduct during the exam, including when to open the testing materials and what is acceptable to bring into the examination room.
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Student behaviors that would be considered
academic misconduct I. A student submits a paper, oral presentation, or demonstration of learning that solely, or largely consists of quotes or paraphrased information from another. Additionally, within the submission, the student does not contribute significant analysis, evaluation, or synthesis of that information.
II. A student relies on group members to complete a group project and provides minimal input to the ideas or product the group is charged with developing. The student asks for his/her name to be on this finished product but he/she will take care of the next group project for everyone else.
III. A student copies text from a resource, changes a few words, and inserts this into his/her own document without proper citation as indicated by the teacher.
IV. A student asks a peer if he/she can copy information directly from a peer’s assignment or assessment onto his/her own document and submits it for evaluation by the teacher.
V. During the IB Examination, a student looks ahead in the IB examination booklet to preview what questions will be asked in later sections of the IB exam.
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School Procedures for Addressing Academic Misconduct on In-Class Assessments
Any instance of academic misconduct will be addressed as outlined by the U-46 District Student Code of Conduct which can be found by scanning the QR code here.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: How does Elgin High School support students in understanding the importance of academic honesty?
A: Early in their freshman year, students engage in a series of lessons and activities geared at teaching students about source reliability, the purpose of citing sources, and the utilization of style guides for properly formatting source citations.
Additionally, students utilize student submission tools, such as TurnItIn.com, to review student work. Students whose work is identified to have a low degree of originality must first conference with the classroom teacher and then resubmit the work to properly address any citation issues. Students, who use TurnItIn.com receive a report that indicates the percentage of their submission that consists of ideas/words from other sources, in comparison to how much of the submission consists of their own original ideas. This is called an originality report. Students should use this as a guide to support making adjustments to their work prior to the final submission to their teacher.
Q: What happens if a student unintentionally engages in academic misconduct?
A: The student and the teacher will conference to discuss how academic misconduct occurred, and what the student should do to ensure that he/she does not accidentally engage in academic misconduct in the future. At this time, the teacher will also discuss options with the student on how to either resubmit the work or complete an alternative assignment. This is up to the teacher’s discretion based upon the assignment and based upon the severity of the misconduct.
Q: What happens if the student is accused of engaging in academic misconduct, but did not?
A: In the event, a student, or parent/guardian, feels there has been an incorrect identification of academic misconduct, either the student or parent can reach out to the administrative team to review the situation. The administrator will conference with the teacher, student, and parent/guardian before making a final determination on the matter and report back to all involved parties on the final decision.
Policy Review
Elgin High School’s DP Academic Honesty Policy is to be reviewed every other odd-numbered year by the EHS IB Committee members, teacher department leadership committees including SIP and SD, building pedagogical leadership team, and parents. Review team members will ensure this policy continues to appropriately support students in proper academic behaviors, align with the school mission, and uphold the IB standards of practice.
Any instance of academic misconduct will be addressed as outlined by the U-46 District Student Code of Conduct which can be found by scanning the QR code here.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: How does Elgin High School support students in understanding the importance of academic honesty?
A: Early in their freshman year, students engage in a series of lessons and activities geared at teaching students about source reliability, the purpose of citing sources, and the utilization of style guides for properly formatting source citations.
Additionally, students utilize student submission tools, such as TurnItIn.com, to review student work. Students whose work is identified to have a low degree of originality must first conference with the classroom teacher and then resubmit the work to properly address any citation issues. Students, who use TurnItIn.com receive a report that indicates the percentage of their submission that consists of ideas/words from other sources, in comparison to how much of the submission consists of their own original ideas. This is called an originality report. Students should use this as a guide to support making adjustments to their work prior to the final submission to their teacher.
Q: What happens if a student unintentionally engages in academic misconduct?
A: The student and the teacher will conference to discuss how academic misconduct occurred, and what the student should do to ensure that he/she does not accidentally engage in academic misconduct in the future. At this time, the teacher will also discuss options with the student on how to either resubmit the work or complete an alternative assignment. This is up to the teacher’s discretion based upon the assignment and based upon the severity of the misconduct.
Q: What happens if the student is accused of engaging in academic misconduct, but did not?
A: In the event, a student, or parent/guardian, feels there has been an incorrect identification of academic misconduct, either the student or parent can reach out to the administrative team to review the situation. The administrator will conference with the teacher, student, and parent/guardian before making a final determination on the matter and report back to all involved parties on the final decision.
Policy Review
Elgin High School’s DP Academic Honesty Policy is to be reviewed every other odd-numbered year by the EHS IB Committee members, teacher department leadership committees including SIP and SD, building pedagogical leadership team, and parents. Review team members will ensure this policy continues to appropriately support students in proper academic behaviors, align with the school mission, and uphold the IB standards of practice.