Academic integrity

When you enrol as a student at Flinders University you become a member of a community that is committed to principles of academic integrity. This commitment maintains Flinders’ reputation and ensures the quality of our research and graduates.

Academic integrity means a commitment to producing your own work and not passing off the work of other people as your own. In the process of creating your own work, you also need to adequately acknowledge the work of other people if you use it.

This is a guide to what academic integrity is, how to develop the academic skills to support it, and what to do if it is breached.

What is academic integrity?

Academic integrity is producing your own work and not passing off the work of other people as your own. It also means adequately acknowledging the work of other people when you include it in your work.

Academic integrity is a form of ethical behaviour that is particularly important to your role as part of the academic community at Flinders University. It is one aspect of the Flinders University graduate qualities that “value ethical behaviour”.

How to avoid breaching academic integrity

These behaviours will breach academic integrity:

Plagiarism is passing off someone else’s work as your own. This includes copying word for word another’s work, paraphrasing or using another’s ideas as if they were one’s own and "borrowing" facts and figures without proper acknowledgement.
Collusion is when two or more students collaborate on an individual assignment. Examples of collusion include letting someone copy your answers on a test or allowing someone to write or edit your assignment.
Cheating is copying answers on a test or commissioning others to write an assignment. Examples include using essay mills and ghost writers.
Fraud is misrepresentation, such as asking someone else to sit your exam or falsifying data.

Find out more about how to avoid plagiarism and collusion by visiting the student FLO (Flinders Learning Online) site on academic integrity.

Check your work for unintentional plagiarism

Text-matching software compares submitted documents against an archive of digital documents, scholastic and news databases, articles and previously submitted papers. A report is generated where all matched text is highlighted and linked to an online source, giving you the opportunity to review your writing and referencing before final assignment submission.

Flinders University provides text-matching software for use by staff & students. Except where an exemption has been granted for special circumstances, all text-based student assignments will be subject to text-matching.

As of the first semester 2016, text-matching will be integrated into the FLO assignment tool. A draft submission box will also be available prior to submitting the final version of your assignment.

Developing your academic skills

Developing strong academic skills makes it easier to maintain academic integrity. Develop your skills by:

asking your tutors or lecturers about specific requirements in your topics;
asking for help from the academics in the Learning Lounge located in the Central and Sturt libraries;
visiting the Student Learning Centre website to find a range of excellent resources on time management, academic reading, note taking, referencing and academic writing;
book an appointment with a Librarian to help you find better academic resources;
checking out the Search Smart guides that can be accessed anywhere at anytime.

Understand the rules

As a student you should know and understand your rights and responsibilities. The consequences for deliberately engaging in academic misconduct can affect your grades and in some cases hinder your future career. Rules, rights and responsibilities around academic integrity are outlined in University policy.