Academic Integrity Report for BMP3003 Further Academic Skills

This report provides a detailed overview of academic integrity, emphasizing its importance in higher education and the implications of academic misconduct, including plagiarism, cheating, and data falsification. It discusses the policies and moral codes implemented by universities to maintain academic effectiveness and safeguard their reputation. Furthermore, the report reflects on the steps taken and difficulties encountered in producing a game related to academic misconduct, highlighting skills learned such as presentation, problem-solving, research, and communication. The conclusion reinforces the significance of academic integrity in fostering honesty and ethical behavior among students and institutions.

Academic integrity

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Section 1 .................................................................................................................................1
An Introduction including a description of Academic Integrity.................................................1
A discussion of the importance of academic integrity in higher education ...............................2
Discuss the implications of academic misconduct .....................................................................2
Section 2 .................................................................................................................................4
Reflect on the steps you have taken, and difficulties encountered in producing the game.........4
Reflect on the skills you have learned this academic year and those emphasized in producing
your game....................................................................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Academic integrity is considered as the commitment as well as demonstration of honesty
and moral behaviour in academic work. It facilitates students to develop new ideas, enhance
knowledge, creativity as well as acknowledging and respecting work of others. Every university
has policies regarding academic integrity to determine and take actions against academic
misconduct. Students have various academic skills and talent that facilitates them to accomplish
academic courses in best possible manner (Abad-García, 2019). These skills are presentation
skills, technical skills and research skills that help to complete determined academic work in
efficient manner. This report segregate in two parts. First part of report contains brief description
of academic integrity and its significance in higher education. Implications of academic
misconduct is covered. In second part, difficulties and challenges that are faced during
production of game and skills that are learnt in game production are mentioned in this project
report.
MAIN BODY
Section 1
An Introduction including a description of Academic Integrity
Academic integrity: The concept of academic integrity is determined as values that are
used in practices in order to complete academic work with efficiency and honesty. It is
considered as the sense of commitment towards academic work of own self as well as others.
Academic integrity is ethical policy and moral code that are followed by the universities and
other institutions. It encourages educational values through avoid misconducts such as
plagiarism, and establishing academic standards. It facilitates to determine accountability as well
as honesty at the time of preparing, submitting academic and gaining credit of own work. It helps
teachers and students to express knowledge, ideas and creativity level in front of others. It is
being expected from students, teachers and other members who are related to academic work to
perform their work with honesty, fairness and respect (Bretag and Harper, 2020). There are some
rules and regulations are formulated by the universities to maintain integrity If these rules are not
followed them it is considered as the the academic misconduct.
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A discussion of the importance of academic integrity in higher education
Academic Integrity is defined as the policies and moral codes that are implemented by
the universities to maintain effectiveness of academic work. It enable students to capture best
knowledge as well as facilitates them to understand academic sessions efficiently. It is important
in higher education dishonest behaviour impacts negatively on learning (Eaton, 2019).
Implementations of high academic standard works as a safeguard reputation and contribute to the
well-being of society.
Importance of academic integrity in higher education
 Academic integrity helps students to express their creative ideas, concepts and thoughts
in front of others with confidence. It enhances students creativity and enable them to
complete their academic work with honesty.
 There is various policies and codes are developed by the universities or institutions to
conduct research in proper way. It facilitates institutions to identify and select appropriate
actions to determine the activities of academic misconduct in institutions.
 By implementing integrity in work, students can get proper guidance and assistance that
enable then to gain depth knowledge and understanding regarding their educational
concepts.
 Academic integrity is also important for institutions because proper implementation of
moral norms and policies maintains strong reputation and brand image of university in
competitive business environment.
 Academic integrity is important for boosting confidence level on students that enable
them to achieve career goals and objectives in efficient manner.
 It inspire students to take active participation in academic programmes. It enhances
students skills, capability and understanding (Ellis, Zucker, and Randall, 2018).
 Integrity is important for students because it motivates them to work hard to get degree in
honest and fair way through putting extra hours in study. It facilitates then to complete
their assignment work on time with greater efficiency.
Discuss the implications of academic misconduct
Academic misconduct: The concept of academic misconduct is considered as the actions
that are performed to gain unfair advantages in academic sessions than other students in
institution. It includes the behaviour of fabrication of data, cheating, plagiarism, altering original
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documents and various others. There are various serious actions are taken by the universities to
avoid misconduct as well as unfair activities (Harris, 2017). Misconducts impacts student's
learning procedure in negative manner. Some misconducts that are performed by the students
during examinations and preparing assignment are discussed as below:
Plagiarism: Plagiarism is the academic misconduct that is related to unfair act ivies of
using others original work without recognising and acknowledging their source or without
granting permission form author. It creates problem in academic work through enhance the
similarity level that indicates work is copied from other's original work.
Cheating: Cheating is related to the action of dishonesty, fraud as well as deceit of
academic assignment. It includes copying others work and communicating answers during
examination.
Unacceptable collaboration: Unacceptable collaboration is defined as the academic
misconduct that take place when students perform academic work in group and someone submit
it as own individual work. It involves utilising ideas, answers and solutions of collaborative work
without citing its authentic source.
Falsification or alteration of data and records: If students alter academic records and
documents is considered as the serious misconduct. It is also related to putting own name on
other student's assignment.
Causes: Students are involved in unfair activities and misconducts because of certain
reasons. Lack of understanding about the rules associated with plagiarism and lack of time as
well as not performing well are the factors that encourage students to perform academic
misconduct (Krom, 2020). Universities create different policies to avoid misconduct and
promote ethical behaviour of students.
There are various consequences are adopted by the university to restrict misconduct from
institute. Various penalties are imposed on students if they conduct offend activities.
Some consequences that are used by the institution regarding academic misconduct are
mentioned as follows:
Loss of intellectual property: There is various academic misconducts are performed by
the students such as plagiarism that is related to cheating other authentic work and property.
Original work is the asset of an owner who invented it. If someone else use it without
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acknowledging owner or taking permission than it is considered as the loss of intellectual
properly.
legal concerns: In academic session, external sponsors provides projects that are based
on real life problems that could be the opportunity for them to attain career goals and objectives.
If students complete these assignment with unfair activities such as cheating, alteration of data
and plagiarism than sponsor can take legal actions against student and university (McGowan,
2019). It may impacts institution's reputation as well as reduce the opportunities for students
attain career objectives.
Inaccurate assessment: If students are involved in serious misconducts like cheating to
take unfair advantages then other students than it restrict instructor to evaluate knowledge, skills
and performance of students. It leads them towards inaccurate assessment.
There is various minor and senior actions are taken by the university against students if
they perform unfair activities in the process of completing assignment. Institution can suspend
students and reduce their marks and various others.
Students should work in ethical manner to reduce the level of academic misconduct.
Students should use cites and academic examples in order to make work more authentic. At the
last of assignment well structured reference list should be provided that reflect sources.
Section 2
Reflect on the steps you have taken, and difficulties encountered in producing the game
In institution, professor has provided us task to design a game to assess various unfair
academic activities and misconducts. I have involved in the activity of designing game with my
classmates to determine plagiarism and other misconducts. It facilitates to reduce the level of
misconduct to complete academic work with more efficiency and effectiveness.
There are various steps are taken by us to produce game. Our instructor assign this task in
group of five members including me. I have taken initiate by introducing my self to others and
than I have allocates work among all group members. There are some difficulties and challenges
are faced by us during the process of developing game (Skyles and Jennings, 2020).
Coordination is the major issue that impact our functioning because every one has their own
ideas and point of views regarding game that create differences. In our group no one has
technical skills accept me that reduces proficiency as well as effectiveness rate of whole game.
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Lack of technicality is the serious concern for us. We also face the problem related to scarcity of
tools to design game that limits success of game to reduce the level of plagiarism and
misconducts.
To produce the game which is quite unique, interesting as well as different from other
games that are conducts for similar purpose of identifying as well as reducing plagiarism we
have conducted deep research that consumes our lot of time and resources. It creates difficulty
for us because we waste out time in research them there is less time is left for game production.
Miscommunication among group members and lack of resources are the problem that are faced
by us during the production of game (van den Hoven and Krom, 2020). In the process of
producing game, we have not conducted outsider testing to check efficiency of game that limits
us to remove various loopholes and insufficiencies. All these challenges and difficulties are faced
by us at the time of designing and producing game with the objective of developing game that
reduce plagiarism.
Reflect on the skills you have learned this academic year and those emphasized in producing
your game
During the designing and producing game, I have learnt various skills and capability that
enhance my personality and enable to attain defined career objectives in best possible manner.
These skills facilitates me to complete academic assignments on time with great efficiency. Skills
that are learnt by me are mentioned below:
Power point presentation skills: It facilitates me to express or represent my ideas,
thoughts and point of views in front of others. As I have presented the game to other members
with the help of power point presentation that enhance my ability to create interest of others and
represent own point of view confidently. Further it help me in studied to complete work in
representable manner to attain good marks.
Problem Solving: There are various problems and difficulties are faced by me in the
process of developing game. It enhances the skill of problems solving through analysing
problems and finding appropriate solutions to improve proficiency. It facilitates me to perform
academic work with great efficiency as well as make enable to resolve problems before they
convert in biggest hurdles.
Academic skills: I have decided the formate of game in which questions related to
academic concept are asked to members. To decided these questions, I have conducted deep
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research that enhance my knowledge of academic concepts. It also improves my communication,
decision-making and writing skills that help me to attain academic goals in best possible way.
Research skills: I have conducted deep research before designing game to gain
information and related data (Wood, 2020). It enables me to get information regarding academic
concepts and use them in assignment to complete them on time with efficiency.
Communication skills: I have learnt communication skills throughout the process of
gamer designing. I have communicated all game rules to participants through showing them
power point slides. It enable me to convey my views to others with clarity and confidence.
CONCLUSION
As per above report, it can be concluded that academic integrity is related to putting
values and work ethics in academic assignments and projects to complete them with fairness and
honesty on defined period of time. Students are involve in various misconducts like act of
cheating, plagiarism, alteration of documents and many more. With the objective of reducing the
level of academic misconduct and unfair activities institutions as well as universities take various
actions and develop policies. There are different types of games are conducted to eliminate
misconducts. Production of games enhances skills and competencies of students that facilitates
them to attain career goals and objectives in most efficient manner.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Abad-García, M. F., 2019. Plagiarism and predatory journals: A threat to scientific integrity.
Anales de Pediatría (English Edition), 90(1), pp.57-e1.
Bretag, T. and Harper, R., 2020. Contract cheating at colleges and other non-university higher
education providers. In A Research Agenda for Academic Integrity. Edward Elgar
Publishing.
Eaton, S. E., 2019. Considerations of corruption, ethics and integrity in educational contexts:
Guest editorial. Journal of Educational Thought/Revue de la Pensée Educative, 52(3),
pp.191-192.
Ellis, C., Zucker, I. M. and Randall, D., 2018. The infernal business of contract cheating:
understanding the business processes and models of academic custom writing sites.
International Journal for Educational Integrity, 14(1), pp.1-21.
Harris, T., 2017. Academic Integrity Policy--October 2017--.
Krom, A., 2020. Empowerment and Conceptual Clarity in Research Integrity. Science and
Engineering Ethics, 26(3), pp.1883-1884.
McGowan, M., 2019. Standing for academic integrity. Advocate: Journal of the National
Tertiary Education Union, 26(1), p.2.
Skyles, S. . and Jennings, J. W., 2020. Academic Honesty, Professional Integrity, and
Undergraduate Engineering Students: Exploring the Connections. University of
Missouri-Saint Louis.
van den Hoven, M. and Krom, A., 2020. Empowerment and Conceptual Clarity in Research
Integrity. Science and engineering ethics, 26(3), pp.1883-1884.
Wood, R., 2020. Academic Integrity as the Conspiracy Theory.
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