Academic Integrity in Higher Education: Importance and Implications of Academic Misconduct

This report discusses academic integrity, its importance in higher education, and the implications of academic misconduct. It includes a reflection on producing a game for Assignment 2. The report covers topics such as the definition of academic integrity, its importance in higher education, and the implications of academic misconduct. It also includes a reflection on the steps taken and difficulties encountered in creating the game.

BSc (Hons) Business Management with Foundation
BMP3003
Further Academic Skills
Academic Integrity
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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Section 1.....................................................................................................................................3
An Introduction including a description of Academic Integrity ...........................................3
A discussion of the importance of academic integrity in higher education ..........................4
Discuss the implications of academic misconduct ...............................................................5
Section 2 ....................................................................................................................................6
Reflect on the steps you have taken, and difficulties encountered in producing the game
for Assignment 2 ..................................................................................................................6
Reflect on the skills you have learned this academic year and those emphasized in
producing your game ............................................................................................................7
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................7
References ........................................................................................................................7

Introduction
The academic integrity is an display and commitment of moral and honest behavior in
the academic setting. The wide academic community and university is formed on norms of
behaviors and shared values which involves honesty, fairness and responsibility. Academic
integrity put these values in to practice being honest in work done at university, being fair
with others and for learning responsibility is taken by following the conventions of
scholarship (Akimova, L.M. and Lysachok, A.V., 2020). In two section the report is
prepared. In section1, covered topics are related to explanation of academic integrity with its
importance in higher education and implication of academic misconduct. In section2,
reflection is provided on the steps taken and difficulties encountered in creating game.
Further, reflection is given on a skills learned while producing game.
Section 1
An Introduction including a description of Academic Integrity
Academic integrity supports in maintaining academic standards and legislation of
educational values through behaviors such as avoidance of plagiarism, cheating etc. In
educational activities academic integrity is act of showing fairness and honesty. Any kind of
academic misconduct is controlled and knowledge is generated between the users of data by
focusing on ethical code. The moral code of conduct is required to be applied by professors,
students and other people by adopting feeling of responsibility, honesty, respect in 5their
behavior of academic data (Buckman, M.M and et.al., 2021). Teaching, research, and service
are three components in which practice of academic integrity is divided. The 'integrity' term
is defined as adherence with moral and ethical principles of individual character. The
integrity is considered as academic misconduct, when integrity rule is not followed by a
person and attracting towards penalty. Earlier academic integrity was related to honor code
which is monitored by students and focusing on pride, power, duty and self-esteem. It
comprises of five core values-
 Honesty- In student behavior it values demands by showing truthful attitude
regarding ideas and knowledge used by them. The students are required to conduct
their own research to create their own knowledge (Ferrand, J and et.al.,2021). The
honesty encourages development of trust as students follows the instructions of
teachers and conduct their work on own name with full honesty without taking and
unauthorized help.

 Trust- The rules, regulations, and policies must be followed fairly by all the members
to avoid the errors. The trust helps in developing relation with peers, instructors which
are basest on actions. With the help of trust it enables students and researchers in
collaborating, sharing information and circulating new ideas without any fear. The
students promotes trust by preparing their work which is honest, thoughtful and
genuine.
 Responsibility- The member of academic community are accountable to themselves
and each other in protecting integrity of scholarship, research, and teaching. It inspires
others to hold academic integrity standards in group (Keddy, P.A and et.al., 2020).
The responsible individuals are accountable for their own actions and work for
discouraging and prevention of misconduct by others.
 Respect- In the academic communities the respect is shown for self and for others.
Respect for self means without compromising own values the challenges are tackled.
Respect for others shows valuing of diverse opinions and appreciating the need to
challenge, refine ideas. The respect is shown by the students when they are valued
and take advantage of opportunity in gaining new knowledge by having active role in
their education and work is performed with their best ability.
 Fairness- It involves components of predictability, transparency, clear and reasonable
expectations. The members of academic community such as faculty, students have
right of expecting fair treatment and also have duty of treating others with fairly. The
students do their original work with fairness and respect academic integrity policies. It
creates the feeling of security and give credits to the real owner of data (Liebman,
B.L., 2021).
A discussion of the importance of academic integrity in higher education
In higher education academic integrity is significant aspect as it is helps in developing
the knowledge with trust and honesty in the individual behavior which helps in gaining good
reputation. The academic skills of a student is developed in the educational approach. The
students and staff have freedom in developing new ideas and knowledge by conducting high
level research on their courses. The academic integrity is important in promoting policies and
procedures by addressing allegation of misconduct (Liebman, B.L., 2021). It is important in
providing training and guidance to the students and staffs which helps develops good
practices in maintaining academic and research integrity. It builds trust on each other which
means people can rely that they will act with honesty by doing correct thing. The trust is also

created with the consistent behavior which show a characteristic of successful leader. The
university needs to be consistent and trustworthy on its standards for the courses and
assessment to create confidence of community in people who are graduating their degrees.
The academic integrity helps in safeguarding from bad consequences which leads to serious
issues like termination from schools or university, imposing of penalty or fine. It is
significant in providing value to a student degree as employers prefer to hire graduates who
have high personal integrity (Mustafa, A.Y., 2020). It is also important in providing the peace
of mind by doing right thing and act consistently with those beliefs. The act of integrity helps
in reduci9ng the stress in life leading to productive, happier and healthier.
Discuss the implications of academic misconduct
It defines to any type of cheating that is occurring in relation to formal academic
exercise. The university takes academic misconduct with serious and ensures to deal with
appropriately and efficiently. It is also known by the name of academic dishonesty, fraud
which is related to several actions on the part of student that go against expected norms of
learning institution, schools or university(Petillion, R.J. and McNeil, W.S., 2020). It involves
plagiarism, cheating, etc. The types of academic misconduct are as follows-
 Cheating- It takes in the form of crib notes, or forbidden of sharing information
among students regrading an exam. It is about taking or giving information that is
used to determine academic results. It involves copying other work from student test,
using of materials such as textbooks, notes without permission of professor in test etc.
 Fabrication- It is the misrepresentation of data, information or citations in the formal
academic exercises. The false claims are performed in research, including selective
submission of results foe excluding inconvenient data to generate fake data. It occurs
often in the sciences, where students develop or modify experimental data. In research
listing a sources in work cited which is not actually used is also a fabrication .
 Plagiarism- It is defined as close intimation of language and thoughts of other author
representing them as one's own original work. It takes the use of thoughts, ideas or
writing of another person and passing on the own name without having proper source
of acknowledgment and without creator permission (Wang, X.Y and et.al., 2020).
 Collusion- It is an act of two or more students working collectively on an single
assignment. On the assessment task the collaboration with the other students without
permission or helping other student to cheat is also considered as collusion. It is in

the form of plagiarism which has unauthorized and unattributed cooperation of
scholar in a portion of assessed work.
The implication of academic dishonesty in universities imposes penalties on the
offending student. The consequence of academic dishonesty leads to loss of intellectual
property such as plagiarism, which is equal to stealing of another person work that is created
by someone else without permission. The instructor is not able to assess performance of
student or in evaluation of student knowledge, skills and applications when students cheat or
plagiarize in academic activities (Wolffram, P., 2020). Due to this, the institutions grant
credentials to those who don't deserve really which puts the serious practical ramifications in
the workplace. The external sponsors grants project to university which is assigned by faculty
to students to provide the opportunity foe working on real-life problems. In such a case, if
student cheat, falsify or fabricate data in the projects then formal action against the university
can be taken by sponsors which will involve fines, loss of future projects etc. It puts the
serious implication on the university reputation as well as loss of opportunities for other
students in future.
Section 2
Reflect on the steps you have taken, and difficulties encountered in producing the game
for Assignment 2
In the present time the competition of education has become important but there is lot
of academic misconduct inn the universities by the students. The students performs the
activities of academic misconduct to attain the goals without much efforts and considered as
illegal practice. To avoid the plagiarism and academic misconduct in the work I thought to
develop a game which will help the students in enhancing their knowledge and skills. While
developing a game I came across with many ideas and selected the best which can be fun and
interesting for the students. The name of game is plag pro which is designed to create an
interest for the students on their own projects without copying with full interest and
enjoyment. I developed the software where students are required to fill their personal details
to play the game. In this game it will provide level of content of project matching to students
age and class. In enhancing the knowledge and to make the students write their content in
own words I developed various images which will be matching with the specific content
helping in avoiding academic misconduct. The images will help in providing further
information where the student will not be able to copy paste in their content. I developed this

game to play free of cost but some amount of money will be charged for its updated version.
To play the game I decided minimum number of players who will play and will get an extra
chance.
Difficulties-
In producing the game I face problem in selection of one game from various
alternatives and giving a name to that. In developing the software with privacy of player I
faced difficulty related to design, technical, graphics etc. In selecting some graphics and
images I faced problem which needs to be matched with the selected content. I also faced
problem that how game will be played, no. of players required to play this game etc. I also
came with an problem of content selection that is need to be matched with the student age
and class.
Reflect on the skills you have learned this academic year and those emphasized in
producing your game
Every individual focuses on their academic skills which helps in analyzing, learning
and understanding the new aspects. The skills helps the individual in developing their
personal and professional life. In making a game I came with lot of skills in which some of
them I was already possessing and some I developed which helped me in making the game
efficient and attractive. I developed the presentation skill which helped me in presenting the
thoughts, ideas in the effective manner. I also gained the knowledge of power point in
making the presentation which involves the several images, diagrams, and text to makes the
content more understandable. This skill helped me in presetting the game to students that
make them easy in understanding. I developed the research skills which shows the ability of
searching, organizing and using specific information. This skill helped in enhancing my
knowledge in regards to various topics and provide better solutions of a problem. I was
already possessing the writing skill which make helped me in writing the game with correct
grammar usage, vocabulary to make more easy understandable.
Conclusion
It is being concluded that academic integrity is important concept in which student
must learned for their betterment in career life. The students can work with more honesty and
integrity to attain the goals. At university level, it has more relevancy in providing credit to
other people while using their ideas. The contribution of the other people is acknowledged.
Academic integrity is the moral code or ethical policy of academia.

References
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Buckman, M.M and et.al., 2021. Treatment Integrity of Primary (Tier 1) Prevention Efforts in
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system. In Ecological integrity and the management of ecosystems (pp. 61-79). CRC
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Liebman, B.L., 2021. William P. Alford: Kindness, Integrity, and Insight. Harv. Int'l LJ, 62,
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