Academic Integrity Process for Students
- Your instructor will contact you to set up a time to meet and discuss the allegation.
- Be sure to respond promptly to your instructor’s message(s) regarding this situation – failing to respond will not make the matter go away.
- In the meeting with your instructor, they will give you an opportunity to hear your side of things. Be honest in your discussion.
- If the instructor feels that an offence did not occur, the matter will be closed.
- However, if the instructor feels an offence did occur, it is their duty to forward it on to the Chair of their department.
- If the assignment or exam is worth less than 10% and you have no prior offences, the Chair of the academic department will resolve the case internally.
- If the assignment or exam is worth more than 10%, or if it is worth less than 10% and you either have a prior offence or do not respond to your instructor’s message(s) to meet, the Chair of the department will forward your case to the Academic Integrity Office in the Dean’s Office (the Divisional Level) for resolution.
- Note that a professor or instructor may not sanction a student.
- The Academic Integrity Office reviews the case to make sure they have all the information required in order to proceed.
- Next, the case is assigned to one of their Dean’s Designates (DD’s) who act on behalf of the Dean to resolve academic integrity cases.
- The Dean’s Designate reviews the case and decides on a course of action.
- You may be invited to attend a meeting with the Dean’s Designate, an Academic Integrity team member, and possibly your instructor (over Zoom) to discuss the allegation, or
- You may receive a Decision letter, allowing you to resolve your academic integrity case quickly by waiving your right to a meeting and agreeing to the sanction set out in the letter. Signing it and returning it by the date indicated means you admit to the offence. However, you have the right to request a meeting with the DD instead of signing the Decision letter.
- Do not drop the course – if you do, you will be reinstated by the Registrar’s Office.
- You may not CR/NCR the course.
- Continue working on all other assignments in the course.
- You will see a GWR standing (grade withheld pending review) placed beside the course on your transcript. This standing will remain until the Academic Integrity case is resolved.
- The meetings are designed to be calm and encouraging – not scary or patronizing.
- You may bring a person with you to the meeting, eg. a friend, family member, peer, or a representative from SCSU, if you’d like.
- If the offence is serious, you may wish to consult a student lawyer at Downtown Legal Services.
- The DD will go over parts of the Code of Behaviour on Academic Matters with you, including the range of sanctions typically applied for the alleged offence in question. Evidence will be presented, along with details supporting the allegation of an academic offence.
- You will have an opportunity to explain your side of the matter and add anything about your personal situation that you’d like the DD to know. They will take this information into account as they make their final decision. You may wish to bring additional documentation to the meeting to support your claim, for example:
- Assignment drafts
- Lecture or class notes
- Research done for a paper or assignment
- Medical documentation
- If you admit to the alleged offence in the meeting, the DD will resolve the case. Their resolution may involve a sanction. Sanctions vary from situation to situation, but the range of sanctions can be found in the Code of Behaviour on Academic Matters (see Appendix C).
- You will not be told what the sanction is during the meeting.
- You will receive a letter after the meeting, informing you of the sanction and your instructor will be requested (by copy of the letter) to submit a final grade in the course for you.
- If you do not admit to the alleged offence, the DD, in consultation with the course instructor and the Chair, may request that the Provost lay a charge against you. If the Provost agrees to lay the charge, the case will proceed to the Trial Division of the University Tribunal and will no longer be handled by the U of T Scarborough Academic Integrity Office.
- You will receive a letter from the Provost informing you that a charge has been laid and describing the next steps.
- If you do not admit to the offence and after careful consideraton of the evidence, the DD believes that an offence did not occur, the DD may dismiss the case.
- You will receive a letter after the meeting informing you that the charge has been dismissed.
- You may be warned in the letter about behaviour which brought you under suspicion.
If you are dissatisfied with the sanction that has been imposed by your Dean, you may refer the matter to the Provost’s Office for consideration. The Provost has delegated authority over the sanction consideration process to the Vice-Provost, Faculty and Academic Life. All requests for consideration of a sanction imposed by a Dean should be sent in an email providing details of the specific request and of the situation, to vpfal.academicdiscipline@utoronto.ca.