BOULDER — The number of students at the University of Colorado at Boulder busted for cheating has increased by nearly 40 percent this academic year, but educators say they aren’t alarmed, crediting increased classroom vigilance for the uptick in reports.
Meanwhile, officials are weighing whether they should renew CU’s contract with a company that provides plagiarism-detection software to faculty or save money and rely on the university’s own licensed technology that performs the same task.
Plagiarism makes up most cheating cases at CU.
During the 2009-10 academic year, the CU Honor Code Council recorded 218 cheating episodes, which is the highest in recent years. The violations numbered 157 in 2008-09, 186 in 2007-08 and 171 in 2006-07, said campus spokesman Bronson Hilliard.
“While the numbers are up significantly over last year, so were the communication efforts about being vigilant,” Hilliard said. “The numbers may reflect the fact that we had a more widespread discussion about academic honesty in the classroom this year.”
The Honor Code Council also investigated nine cheating cases in the Graduate School, which is atypical.
John Stevenson, interim dean of the Graduate School, said CU is better communicating to educators that the honor code is not designed just for undergraduates.
“Over the last few years, I’ve worked for there to be a closer connection between the Graduate School and the honor code,” he said.
Joseph Rosse, chairman of the Boulder Faculty Assembly, said honor-code violations are a concern to faculty members. The assembly hasn’t analyzed why there might be an increase, but Rosse suspects that faculty members have become better at detecting dishonesty.
Academic dishonesty
The number of cheating episodes recorded by the CU Honor Code Council:
2009-10: 218
2008-09: 157
2007-08: 186
2006-07: 171
Source: CU-Boulder
