September 22, 2023

Dear faculty members,

With the beginning of the academic year upon us, this is a good time to introduce myself, provide you with updates on issues related to academic integrity at the University of Oregon—including important changes to the Student Conduct Code—and provide suggested guidance related to ChatGPT and other generative AI tools.

Introduction

I started my tenure as Associate Dean of Students and Director of Student Conduct and Community Standards (SCCS) in October 2021, after spending over a decade in the Office of Student Conduct at UCLA. I have been thrilled to expand on my experience facilitating the student conduct process with another high-profile, public-facing institution like the University of Oregon for the last two years. Linda Gatton joined the team as Assistant Director of SCCS in June 2023 after most recently serving as Director of Student Judicial Affairs at California State University, Chico. Our staff is rounded out by two Student Conduct Coordinators who serve as Case Managers. For the first time in almost two years, we will be fully staffed! One of my major goals in this role is to increase awareness, transparency, and buy-in from faculty into this process—as such, please feel free to reach out to me anytime with questions, concerns, and requests for consultation.

Removal of Faculty Resolution Option

The Board of Trustees approved a change to the Student Conduct Code that requires any academic misconduct concerns to be adjudicated by SCCS where a grade penalty may result from a violation. This change was implemented to ensure that the protections and rights embedded in the formal student conduct process are afforded to students, especially given the potentially significant impact that a grade penalty may have on them. This change also reduces faculty burden in adjudicating instances of academic misconduct directly and diverts potential grievance claims and legal liability from faculty to SCCS.

You retain the ability to resolve academic misconduct concerns informally and you are encouraged to consult directly with SCCS to discuss resolution options that may be available for any particular incident. We are generally able to accommodate same-day consultations with instructors or otherwise respond to inquiries within 24 hours.

Even when not considering a grade penalty for academic misconduct violations, we encourage you to utilize the Reporting Academic Misconduct Form to submit incidents for our review.

• The formal student conduct process allows us to have educational conversations with students about academic misconduct, determine where there may be knowledge gaps, and provide education about expectations moving forward.
• SCCS maintains records about any prior or future violations by a student and can address when there is information to suggest a pattern of behavior.

Changes to Definitions of Plagiarism and Unauthorized Collaboration

The Board of Trustees has also approved changes to the definitions of Plagiarism and Unauthorized Collaboration. Our hope is that these augmented definitions serve as helpful tools for instructors in communicating expectations for academic integrity in your courses. These changes take effect immediately and I encourage you to incorporate these definitions into your course syllabus and in discussions with students about academic misconduct.

Plagiarism: Presenting another’s material as one’s own, including using another’s words, results, processes, or ideas, in whole or in part, without giving appropriate credit. Plagiarism is contingent on the content of the submitted work product, regardless of whether the unattributed material was included intentionally or unintentionally. The use of material taken from any source—whether directly quoted, paraphrased, or otherwise adapted—must be attributed to that source.

Plagiarism also includes the submission of material generated by others. This may include artificial intelligence (AI) content generators and generative AI tools such as ChatGPT; websites with a question-and-answer feature such as CourseHero, Chegg, and Bing; assistance from tutors or online language translators that results in unoriginal work; and work that is purchased or otherwise prepared by another individual.

Unauthorized Collaboration: Working with others in the submission of an assignment, exercise, or other academic requirement for assessment when not expressly permitted by the instructor.

This section is not intended to prohibit the type of collaboration that promotes productive discourse and learning between students, such as engaging with lecture materials or course texts; discussing subject matter concepts, ideas, and themes; talking through problem-solving strategies and approaches; or study groups working to prepare for an exam. Unless expressly prohibited by the instructor, such collaboration is encouraged to the extent that students remain able to submit work for assessment which reflects their own individual interpretations, analysis, and conclusions. This level of collaboration will not constitute a violation of the Code, unless expressly prohibited by the instructor.

The Board of Trustees considers changes to the Student Conduct Code proposed by the Student Conduct Advisory Committee (SCAC), which is comprised of students, staff, and faculty appointed by ASUO, OA Council, and Faculty Senate.

If you have an interest in learning more about the SCAC, want to provide feedback for their consideration, or would like to serve on the Committee, please reach out to me.

ChatGPT and other Generative AI Tools

Allegations of plagiarism involving the use of generative AI tools have constituted over half of all academic misconduct reports submitted to the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards (SCCS) from February 2023. With this in mind, it is clear that this is an area where clarity around expectations and appropriate usage are warranted. As such, I join with the Office of the Provost in encouraging all faculty to consider and determine your own course philosophy and expectations around the use of generative AI tools for each of your courses, communicate those expectations in your course syllabus, and discuss them in the first week of the term. Sample course syllabus language can be found at teaching.uoregon.edu/teaching-and-generative-ai.

If you have determined that the use of generative AI tools will be prohibited on some or all assignments in your course, there are a number of methods that can be used to detect potential violations.

You may consider:

• Running your specific assignment prompt through a generative AI tool one or more times for response, and looking for similarities in ideas, words, and structure from those responses with work submitted by students.
  • A distinctive feature of AI generated content is a propensity to include factually inaccurate or otherwise fabricated information, and a student who has used a generative AI tool will typically submit work that contains similar inaccuracies.
• Comparing the assignment of concern with other work submitted by the student and looking for distinct and significant changes in writing style. You may also see distinct changes in style within a single assignment.
• Verifying quotes, sources, and citations used in the assignment. Generative AI tools may fabricate these in a manner that may appear legitimate at first glance but can be easily debunked on further review.
• Writing your assignment prompts in a manner that makes generative AI use more obvious, with an emphasis on specificity. This may include requiring students to focus on specific topics covered in the course, or only use materials assigned in the course.

The University of Oregon has determined that the use of online AI detection tools like Turnitin.com or GPTZero may not be effective and can result in false positives. If you choose to utilize these tools, please note that while they can be suggestive of academic misconduct, we would not consider the percentages provided by these tools as dispositive on their own. You may use these tools and the percentages generated by them as a starting point, or an additional factor in assessing your own concerns with the content of a student’s work. However, without any additional information or an acknowledgement from the student that they used a generative AI tool, there may not be enough to find that they engaged in a violation of the Code. We can still have educational conversations with students even when there is not enough information to find a violation, so we encourage you to continue to refer these cases to SCCS for review when you have concerns about potential academic misconduct.

If you have questions or would otherwise like to discuss the information contained above, please feel free to reach out to me (diannet@uoregon.edu) or Linda Gatton (lgatton@uoregon.edu) and we can schedule time to connect or correspond by email.

Sincerely,

Dianne Tanjuaquio, M.Ed. (she/her/hers)
Associate Dean of Students
Director of Student Conduct and Community Standards (SCCS)