Assessment Offences – what counts as cheating?

Author Student Communications | Posted on
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You’ve most likely heard your module or programme leader talk about assessment offences: but what are they? Can you use AI? What’s an essay mill? How much does referencing matter?

Read on to get clarity so you’re not at risk.

Let’s chat AI first

Headline: Speak to your tutor about appropriate use of AI.

The University has published guidance on the appropriate use of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

Don’t submit AI-generated work off as your own original work. You should ask your tutor about whether you can use AI in assessments. If you do use AI, reference its use – here’s guidance on how to do this. If you’re in any doubt about using AI, or how to reference it, speak to your module leader.

Contract cheating, ghost writing and essay mills

Headline: Someone writes something for you but you’re listed as the author – often for a fee.

Ghost writing services and essay mills are when you pay a company to write your work for you. You may have Follow requests on Instagram from these services.

We’ve heard some horror stories of students using essay mills and then being blackmailed by the company – saying they’ll tell the university that the student didn’t write the work themselves. Essay mills might make it look like you’re saving time, money and effort – but long term it’s not in your best interest.

Here’s the full list of what counts as contract cheating:

  • Submitting as your own work which has been produced in whole or part by another person on your behalf;
  • Making available, or seeking to make available, material to another student or students with the intention that it is used by them to commit an assessment offence e.g. posting exam questions online.

Collusion

Headline: Working with one or more students to create a piece of work but submit it as your own.

We understand that collusion can seem like a good thing, especially as many courses have group work as part of them. But collaboration and group work should only be used when indicated by the module leader. We want to hear your original thoughts and ideas!

Here’s the full list of what counts as collusion:

  • Unethically collaborating with one or more students to complete an assignment, take an exam, or engage in other academic activities with the intent to deceive or gain an unfair advantage. This can include sharing answers or jointly submitting work when individual efforts are stipulated;
  • Assisting another person in the completion of work submitted as that other person’s own unaided work;
  • Sharing your work with another person and/or permitting them to copy all or part of it and submit it as their own unaided work.

Controlled conditions

Headline: Using extra resources not allowed for timed assessments.

Controlled conditions are timed assessments e.g. an exam.

Cheating in this context can include using additional resources for the assessment, like an annotated book or a mobile devices you’re not allowed or chatting to other people about your answers.

Here’s the full list of what counts as cheating in exams:

  • Having in your possession materials and / or devices which are not allowed for that assessment;
  • Fraudulent activity, e.g. gaining access to the questions or solutions in advance of an assessment and using this to fraudulently complete the assessment;
  • Unauthorised communications, including the use of online platforms to discuss online assessments;
  • Arranging for someone else to impersonate a student in an assessment.

Plagiarism

Headline: Submitting someone else’s work as your own.

This is the most common form of plagiarism. It’s so easy to be caught out unintentionally.

Plagiarism can be as simple as quoting an author in an essay and not referencing it correctly.

Did you know you can even self-plagiarise? This means submitting a piece of your own work twice – e.g. for two separate assignments.

Here’s the full list of what counts as cheating via plagiarism:

  • Copying from another person’s work without the use of quotation marks;
  • Copying from another person’s work without referencing/acknowledgement of the sources;
  • Summarising another person’s work by simply changing a few words or altering the order of presentation;
  • Paraphrasing material from a source without acknowledging the original author;
  • Not respecting or acknowledging the copyright and intellectual property of others;
  • Presenting concepts or designs that have been created by others without acknowledging the original source;
  • Copying another student’s work with or without their knowledge or agreement;
  • Downloading material from the web and submitting it as your own work, or submitting work created by using AI tools without acknowledgement;
  • Using course notes without referencing.

Check out the Library’s workbook on how to reference to avoid plagiarism.

Falsification

Headline: Making stuff up!

Maybe your experiment didn’t go to plan, and so you ‘tweak’ the results to work for you. That’s falsification!

Here’s the full list of what counts as falsification:

  • Falsifying or misrepresenting the results of experimentation/research data;
  • Falsifying your references and/or bibliography or in-text citations;
  • Falsifying reports or projects.

Fabrication

Headline: Making stuff up again!

Maybe you’ve not planned your assignment properly, so you panic and make stuff up to fill the word count. That’s fabrication.

Here’s the full list of what counts as fabrication:

  • Reporting on experiments/research never performed or data never collected.
  • Providing references or/and in-text citations that do not exist.

Research ethics breaches

Headline: Doing something that is against the University’s Research Ethics

As your research proposals are signed off by an academic, this should rarely happen. If you’re not sure about the ethics of the work you are doing, speak to your module leader or research project supervisor.

Summing up

You might have noticed a theme in all of these Assessment Offences: they all mean that the work you’re submitting is not your own.

Remember, the point of assessments is to:

  • check your understanding of a subject;
  • showcase your original thoughts and ideas;
  • prepare you for your future career.

So, we want to see your work, your ideas, and grade and award you appropriately!

If you are tempted to cheat, or want advice on how best to present your work, there are loads of resources available – or speak to your module leader for advice.

Further resources

https://www.uwe.ac.uk/study/academic-information/assessments/academic-integrity

https://www.uwe.ac.uk/study/study-support/study-skills#ai-guides

https://www.uwe.ac.uk/study/study-support/peer-assisted-learning

https://www.uwe.ac.uk/study/study-support/study-skills/referencing

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