Guidance for Schools on managing online examination misconduct cases at Levels 1 & 2

Schools are responsible for dealing with allegations of plagiarism and collusion in online examinations relating to students in levels 1 and 2 of undergraduate programmes, where the allegation is the first relating to the student. (The Student Conduct Team continues to deal with all cases of on-campus exam misconduct at all levels).

Repeat offences and all Honours and postgraduate cases should be referred to the Student Conduct Team in the normal way.  If Schools are unsure whether there has been a prior offence (e.g. if the student is studying across different Schools or Colleges), the Student Conduct team can check for you – please email student-conduct@glasgow.ac.uk. An offence would be considered ‘repeat’ if it took place after the student had been interviewed by the School or Senate Assessors or had received an in absentia penalty. If two or more allegations are made about the student at the same time (i.e. in the same exam diet), please refer these to the Student Conduct Team.

Process

Schools should follow the same process already in use for plagiarism and collusion cases in assignments at Levels1 and 2. This process is well established and is detailed here together with example letters.

For online exam cases where only one question is affected, the ‘in absentia’ process can also be used rather than interviews. In these cases, Schools should email the student, advising that there is a concern about their answer and providing the evidence. The student should be asked to provide a written response to the allegation within one week. If the student admits to the allegation or denies (for example) an allegation of collusion but reveals that they have in fact plagiarised, then a penalty can be offered without the need for them to attend an interview. The student has the right to request an interview if they wish.

An example ‘initial email’ and outcome letters can be found here.

Establishing What Has Happened

In determining whether plagiarism or collusion has occurred, the same principles used in coursework cases apply.  Even in open book exams, students can only receive marks for their own original and individual work – material copied or insufficiently paraphrased from textbooks, online sources, lecture notes, etc, or that has been produced jointly with other students, or that has been AI generated, doesn’t demonstrate to the marker that the student has understood the material.  Schools should provide the student with a copy of the Turnitin report (or marked up work, if Turnitin is not used) and the sources it is alleged they have copied from, so that the evidence to support the allegation is clear to the student.  Students often state that they didn’t intend to plagiarise or collude, but intent can’t be considered.

Collusion allegations can be more difficult to evidence but are supported by students presenting identical, unusual answers or calculations, particularly where the same errors appear, the same phrasing/strange wording/synonyms or grammatical/spelling errors.   When two or more students are found to have submitted identical, or very similar, exam answers, it is reasonable to assume there has been collusion. However, the Senate Assessors have found that cases presented as collusion often turn out to be plagiarism, where the students have copied from the same source as each other, rather than colluded with each other. 

Common Scenarios

  1. The students have colluded – either by working on the answers together, or inappropriately collaborating, using jointly prepared revision notes or by one copying from another
  2. The students have copied from the same English language source
  3. The students have copied from the same non-English language source and used Google Translate or similar, resulting in the same or very similar translation
  4. The students have used an answer posted to an online ‘homework help’ site, which other students have also accessed and used
  5. The students have generated their answers using AI using the exam question as the prompt, and have received similar output

All five scenarios represent a breach of the Code of Student Conduct, as the answers are not the students’ own individual work.

Cases involving students who are thought to be responsible for posting exam questions to ‘homework help’ sites, or who are suspected of using AI-generated answers, can be referred to the Senate Assessors as typically more substantial penalties are applied for these types of breaches.

Penalties

Schools are asked to mirror the penalties being applied by the Senate Assessors at Honours and postgraduate level, so that there is consistency and fairness across outcomes. Typically, the following are applied for first offences of exam misconduct:

Plagiarism from books, online sources or course materials, or collusion with another student

A reprimand, and a mark of zero for the answer affected by the misconduct. This should apply to the whole answer, rather than subsections. If more than one answer is affected, a grade of H should be applied for the whole exam, rather than zero for each affected answer. If the penalty has the effect that the overall course result prevents progression, a resit, with the exam result and the course result capped at the pass mark, should be offered. If the exam is already a resit, no further opportunity can be given but you can allow the first attempt mark to stand. Depending on the understanding of plagiarism shown by the student, a referral to SLD may also be appropriate.  If in a collusion case it’s discovered that the student whose work was copied had no knowledge of this, they should not receive a penalty.

Use of ‘homework help’ sites (e.g.Chegg)

If the student has copied an answer posted, but did not post the question(s), the same penalty as above should be applied.

If the student has posted the question(s) as well as copying the answer(s), this indicates a clear intention to gain an unfair advantage and has also facilitated misconduct by other students. They should receive a reprimand or severe reprimand, depending on the extent of the misconduct and their explanation, and a grade of H for the whole exam. Depending on how serious the School deems the offence to be they may decide not to permit a resit opportunity. If a resit is allowed, the exam result and course result must be capped at the pass mark. If the exam is already a resit, no further opportunity can be given but the first attempt result may be allowed to stand.

Use of AI-generated content

Typically, if this allegation can be evidenced, a grade of H with no resit opportunity, or refusal of credit, will be applied. Evidence can highlight a conversational, rather than a reflective writing style; inclusion or unexpected omission of material relevant to topic; a lack of citation or quotation to evidence arguments; lack of alignment between sources listed in the bibliography with Turnitin, or confirmation of fictitious references.

Follow Up

In all cases – whether dealt with via the in absentia process or by interview – outcomes must be copied to student-conduct@glasgow.ac.uk so that we can keep our records up to date in case of repeat offences. The letter should also be copied to the member of staff who made the initial report and to the Chief Adviser of the student’s College.

Students have the right to appeal against the decision reached by the School.  This information is included in the template letters found in the links above.