Abstract of the Honor Council
Case 24, Spring 2005
August 28, 2005

Members Present:
John Horstman (presiding), Brandon Mack, Laura Campo, Tina Chen, J.L. Kappes (observing), Court Jackson, Chris Edwards, Simon Doyle, Rebecca Glisan, Charles Lawrie

Ombuds:
Brandon Wagner

Letter of Accusation:
The Honor Council received a letter of accusation from a professor in an undergraduate science course. The letter explained that Student A was suspected of plagiarizing and failing to cite sources on a web-based project for the course.

Evidence Submitted:

• Letter of Accusation
• Written Statement
• Paper of Student A
• Alleged Sources from Professor
• Cited Sources
• Assignment Prompt
• Course Syllabus
• Originals of the submitted alleged sources

Plea:
Student A pled “In Violation.”

Testimony:
Student A began her opening statement by explaining that she had no intention of plagiarizing on the paper, or breaking the Honor Code. She claims the professor never explained how to cite sources, and she had to research how to cite the sources for her paper.

A member of the Council asked Student A if they had ever had an assignment that required citation. Student A responded that she had not encountered an assignment in which she had to cite sources. Another member asked Student A if she felt that her work met the professor’s expectations. Student A responded that she had little to no experience in writing papers, and she interpreted the web project as a synthesis of web sources into one uniform paper. 

Student A was asked to look at her work and the alleged sources that were plagiarized in order to make the distinction between what was her work and what was plagiarized. Student A responded that she broke the Honor Code, and that there was not a clear distinction between her work and the alleged sources.

A member of the council asked Student A about the process she used to write the paper. Student A responded that she worked for ten to twelve hours on the project, and used four to five different web pages including Google and NASA websites. She found websites that she liked and copied and pasted specific passages into a Microsoft Word document.

A Council member asked Student A if she had ever written a paper before. Student A responded that she had never written a paper while at Rice.

A Council member asked Student A if she knew how to cite internally. Student A responded that she did not know how to do internal citation, but did cite the webpages she used at the end of the paper.

Student A was asked how did she use the Word document in writing the paper. Student A responded that she copy and pasted sections from the web pages she found, and then paraphrased the pasted sections in her paper.

A member of the Council asked about certain passages that were missing source citations. Student A responded that the missing citations were an honest mistake.

A member of the Council asked if Student A had copied photos into her project. Student A responded that she did copy photos, but cited them at the bottom of the paper.

Student A was asked if she discussed the project with other students. She responded that she did not talk about the project with other students, but discovered her topic through a news website.

A member of the Council asked Student A if she understood that paraphrased work has to be cited. Student A responded that she did understand that paraphrased work required citation.

As a closing statement, Student A reiterated that she had learned her lesson, and would a better job of citing her sources. She assured the Council that this will not happen again.

Deliberation:

The Council initially arrived at a consensus that Student A poorly paraphrased from the websites, but she did make an attempt to cite the paraphrased work. The Council also agreed that it was hard to distinguish between Student A’s own thoughts and work from the paraphrased material.  The Council also agreed that Student A did fail to cite paraphrased work.

The Council then took a straw poll to determine whether a violation had occurred.

Straw Poll #1: Is there clear and convincing evidence that a violation occurred?
Yes: 9 +1(observing)
No: 0
Abstentions: 0

The Council then took another straw poll to determine if Student A violated the Honor Code.

Straw Poll #2: Is thee clear and convincing evidence that Student A violated the Honor Code?
Yes: 9+1(observing)
No: 0
Abstentions: 0

The results of Straw Polls #1 and #2 were made binding.

Penalty deliberations began with a discussion of whether or not Student A committed the violation under extreme or emotional distress. The Council agreed that there was no evidence to suggest that Student A was under extreme or emotional distress. Next, the Council discussed if there was any evidence to suggest that the violation occurred due to actions unknown to the accused. The Council then discussed whether or not they believed that Student A offered a plea of “In Violation” in good faith.  The Council agreed that the plea was made in good faith.  The Council then deliberated on the nature of the violation. First, the Council considered the nature of the assignment, given that the web project was a considerable part of the grade. Council member voiced their belief that the web project did not contain huge portions of direct copy and pasting from the websites used. Also, Council members also voiced their belief that they believed that the failure to cite and paraphrasing was done carelessly, and not maliciously. 

The Council then took a straw poll to determine a penalty.

Straw Poll #3: Choose a Penalty
F+2 semester suspension: 0
F+1 semester suspension: 0
F in the course: 2
2 letter grade reduction: 2
1 letter grade reduction: 2 +1 (observing)
Abstentions: 3

Most of the abstaining members were considering the 2 letter grade reduction penalty. The abstaining members considered the paraphrasing to be poor, but considered the bibliography at the end of the paper to be an attempt to cite. The abstaining members were also considering if Student A provided full disclosure of all relevant information. One member of the Council pointed out that Student A admitted to missing one of the citations to suggest that Student A provided full disclosure.

Members of the Council who were considering the F in the Course penalty spoke about how they reached their decision. These members took suspension off the table given the cooperation of Student A. These students also believed that Student A’s violation was not malicious, but pointed out that almost the entire project is poorly paraphrased with no internal citation. One member of the Council did point out that there appeared to be a synthesis of the websites, but very little independent work on the part of Student A.

A second Straw Poll was taken to determine a penalty

Straw Poll #4: Choose a Penalty
F+1: 0
F in the course: 1
2 letter grade reduction: 4
1 letter grade reduction: 4+1 (observing)
Abstentions: 0

The Council continued to deliberate on the extent of the paraphrasing done by Student A. Some members of the Council who voted for the 1 letter grade reduction considered the bibliography as evidence of Student A attempting to cite sources. Other members considering the 2 letter grade reduction, considered the amount of paraphrasing to be extremely large, and the low amount of independent work provided by Student A as the basis of their decision.

A third Straw Poll was taken to determine a penalty

Straw Poll #5: Choose a Penalty
F in the course: 0
2 letter grade reduction: 6
1 letter: 3+1 (observing)
Abstentions: 0

The Council attempted to strive for unanimity. Council Members who voted for the 2 letter grade reduction believed that if they reduced the penalty further they would be considering remorse, which cannot be a reason to mitigate a penalty.

Straw Poll #5 was made binding

Thus, the Honor Council finds Student A “In Violation” of the Honor Code and recommends a penalty of a grade of 2 letter grade reduction.

Time of hearing and deliberation: 1 hour 11 minutes.

Respectfully Submitted,

Brandon Mack
Clerk