I am a student at the College of Management studying Management Information
Systems (MIS) and I have an individual membership with the Center for Academic Integrity (CAI). I have been affiliated with the Beacon Leadership Project (BLP) at the University of Massachusetts Boston (UMB) since fall semester, 2002. The BLP is a service-learning project where students take an “integrative and collaborative learning approach to student leadership development” (http://www.umb.edu/leadership).
The service-learning project I chose to implement is the Academic Integrity Committee Club (AICC) at UMB. On February 26, 2003 the AICC became officially recognized by the Student Government Association (SGA) at UMB. I am proud to say that this was a monumental milestone.
The AICC affirms its opposition to policies and practices which deprive any individual of a right or privilege because of race, gender, color, creed, religion, age, national origin, disability or sexual orientation.
The AICC’s impetus and strategy is to advocate academic integrity by garnering like-minded students, faculty, and administrators in our hope to foster a strong foundation of academic principles and integrity at UMB.
The Academic Integrity Committee Club is currently working on a series of campaigns for the spring semester: building and retaining membership, Academic Integrity Week, placard/poster promoting visibility and awareness, and orientation week mock presentations, mini-movie followed by Q&A.
The AICC’s long term goals are to usurp the “latticework of interwoven interests”* and mind boggling political affiliations within the administration by implementing a peer review committee to the judicial affairs process, garner support from UMass Boston students, faculty, and staff to become an institutional member of the Center for Academic Integrity (CAI), and to implement the academic integrity assessment guide provided by the CAI.
“Despite renewal efforts in our educational institutions, the rise in level of cheating continues. Professor Donald McCabe, [founding president and chair of the membership committee for the Center of Academic Integrity, is associate provost for campus development at Rutgers University-Newark, NJ 07102; [email protected]] reported the following statistics in June 2002 at the annual assessment conference of the American Association for Higher Education held in Boston:”**
Student self-reported cheating:**Serious cheating 23%Serious written cheating 50%Internet plagiarism 40%Downloading paper 4%Collaboration 44%Faculty observed cheating:**Serious cheating 52%Serious written cheating 84%Internet plagiarism 60%Downloading paper 28%Collaboration 55%
These numbers are staggering and hard to digest, but this University must tackle academic integrity and lead by example to help combat and promote the standards and practice of academic integrity. This is why we are starting this club at UMB. Our grades and our degrees are important to us; and we want that to mean something when we graduate. We also want to show to the academic circles that we firmly believe in supporting academic integrity at this University.
Sincerely yours,J. Stone Laraway IIPresident and Founder, AICC”All truth in the long run, is only common sense clarified.” Thomas Henry Huxley