General Contact Information
Phone: 646-660-6500
Fax: 646-660-6501
Email:
provost.office@baruch.cuny.edu
Mailing Address:
Office of the Provost & Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs
Baruch College/CUNY
One Bernard Baruch Way
Box D-701
New York, NY 10010-5585
Walk-In Address:
Administrative Center
135 East 22nd Street, 7th Floor
Office of the Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs
Message Archive
Tuesday, November 24, 2015
This email is being sent to all members of the Baruch College faculty.
For an archive of announcements sent from the Associate Provost beginning June 2011, click here.
Dear Faculty Colleagues,
At the meeting of the General Faculty this fall, and at the school faculty meetings since, Provost Christy has offered a suggestion related to academic integrity issues.
Research described in publications such as Dan Ariely, The (Honest) Truth About Dishonesty (HarperCollins 2012), suggests that when people write and sign statements before taking exams affirming that they will not cheat, the amount of cheating on that exam sharply drops. The drop, if any, is far less steep when people are asked to sign printed statements or if this process takes place at the conclusion of the exam.
Versions of this practice have been advanced as best practices for a wide variety of academic assignments. As we approach the home stretch of the semester, with its attendant final assignments, papers, and exams, the provost’s office encourages members of the faculty to experiment with this approach. Again, it should include asking students to write a statement themselves (i.e., not merely sign a statement that you circulate) and sign it before taking an exam—or at the beginning of a written assignment/paper.
The statement should be brief, such as: “I have neither given nor received unauthorized assistance on this exam” (or “I will neither give nor receive unauthorized assistance on this exam”) or, for other types of assignments: “The work in this assignment is my own. Any outside sources have been properly cited.”
We hope that widespread use of such a statement will help convey to students the shared values of our community—our belief that academic integrity and honesty are essential to learning—and we will be interested to hear whether you think that the effort has been successful.
With best wishes for a very happy Thanksgiving,
Dennis Slavin
Associate Provost and Assistant Vice President
Baruch College, CUNY
646-660-6504 (phone); 646-660-6531 (fax)
http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/provost/teaching_learning.htm
