The Integrity Council is one step closer to drafting new policy reform concerning academic misconduct on campus.
A resolution to revise the Integrity Council’s Academic Misconduct Code was passed unanimously Tuesday night by the UOSA Undergraduate Student Congress.
The resolution, introduced by Brett Stidham, Congress chairman and Integrity Council member, calls for Congress to encourage Provost Nancy Mergler and OU President David Boren to draft a reformed version of the academic misconduct policy on campus.
“All students have a vested interest in academic integrity, so let’s put adequate safeguards in place while we protect students’ rights,” said Stidham, human resources management senior.
The new system provides for equal faculty and student involvement to create a more community concept, said Breea Bacon, Academic Integrity Systems assistant director.
This semester, the Integrity Council plans to revise the Academic Misconduct Code to create a more student-led system and switch from a punitive system for students who violate the academic misconduct code to a more rehabilitative system in which students understand and learn to value the importance of academic integrity, Bacon said.
Prior to Tuesday night’s UOSA meeting, Integrity Council chairwoman Elizabeth Miracle educated various members of UOSA on the proposed changes.
Receiving Congress’s approval is just one in a series of steps the Integrity Council must go through to modify the Academic Misconduct Code and create a system for which students can feel some ownership, Bacon said.
A similar resolution was unanimously passed during the Oct. 11 Faculty Senate meeting, following the resolution’s introduction during the Sept. 13 Faculty Senate meeting.
Prior to last week’s meeting, Assistant Provost and Director of Academic Integrity Systems Gregory Heiser called most of the Faculty Senate members and answered any questions they may have had, which helped smooth the process at last week’s meeting, Bacon said.
The next step for the Integrity Council’s proposal is taking the resolution to the Graduate Student Senate.
After speaking with GSS, the Integrity Council will work out a constitutional outline by establishing a committee consisting of five students and five faculty members who will draft the whole piece of legislation, Miracle said.
Integrity Council plans on presenting the revised code to the OU Board of Regents late this semester or early next semester in hopes of implementing the next system by the start of the 2011-2012 academic school year, Bacon said.
“We want everyone on board with this system, including faculty, students and administration, before we present this to the (OU) regents,” Bacon said.
— Kathleen Evans contributed to this report
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briareus 1 year, 7 months ago
In other words, facilitate cheating.
LauraGibbs 1 year, 7 months ago
Is there somewhere online we can read about these proposed changes? I went to the Integrity Council website and could not find anything there; the most recent minutes posted in their Minutes section were dated September 2009, and the last blog post was in May 2010. It would be helpful if there were somewhere online where we could learn about how the proposed new system would work.