Academic Integrity for Georgian Students

Intro to Academic Integrity

Students come to college at various points in life, for many reasons. Whether you’re new to college, returning to take a new program, re-training, pursuing a career change, away from home for the first time, working while attending, in a new country, or the first person in your family to attend college, academic integrity values are a set of principles that help give meaning and worth to the work you do while you’re here.

The International Center for Academic Integrity (2021), defines Academic Integrity as a commitment to uphold six fundamental values in the academic community, even when faced with adversity. The values include: honesty, trust, fairness, respect, responsibility and courage.

You are expected to uphold these values and meet the Academic Integrity regulations specified by Georgian College in all work that you do. We know you have a busy schedule, and many students are juggling multiple responsibilities. Completing your work with integrity, even when you face adverse conditions, is an excellent step towards learning the skills and knowledge necessary for your career and building transferable skills.

Think about it. Your professors create assignments that help you demonstrate what you’ve learned. As you complete assignments, you practice valuable skills like critical thinking, problem solving, effective communication and time management. These skills will carry you through your other classes, your future education, and into your career. To get the most out of your education, work with integrity and avoid breaches of academic integrity!

Breaches of Academic Integrity (both intentional and unintentional) occur when a student doesn’t uphold the values of honesty, trust, fairness, respect, responsibility and courage. Georgian’s Academic Regulations outline 7 types of academic integrity breaches. You’ll need to read the full regulation, but here’s a quick overview of the types of breaches.

Cheating occurs when you don’t do your own work – including when you use unauthorized tools, take answers from another student’s exam, ask someone to do your work for you, or purchase an assignment online.

Fabrication refers to the creation or falsification of fake data, citations and references, information, or even work documents.

Plagiarism occurs when you use the words, ideas, designs or other work that is not your own without properly referencing and citing them.

Facilitating a breach of academic integrity happens if you assist another student in a way that causes a breach of academic integrity, such as making your work available, allowing them to copy, or helping them to fabricate, cheat or plagiarize.

Impersonation occurs when someone pretends to be another person, such as completing a test or exam on behalf of the other person, or attending a job interview on someone’s behalf.

Denying access to information or material involves making resources unavailable to other students or deliberately misleading them.

Finally, copyright violation occurs when you use copyrighted material (like a textbook, library resource, video, or audio recording) without permission.

This is just a brief introduction to the types of academic integrity breaches. Make sure to read the college’s academic integrity regulations for the full definition of these breaches. You are responsible for upholding Academic Integrity values and avoiding breaches in all work you do at Georgian.

While it seems like academic integrity applies only in college, choosing to complete your academic work with integrity helps you to be better prepared for future employment. Integrity breaches can have serious consequences in the work world, too. Your reputation and employment are at risk if you cheat, plagiarize or deny access to information or resources. Your company may face legal action if you use other’s work without permission, fabricate data or information, or violate copyright.

Learn more about Academic Integrity by completing this tutorial, reading the Academic regulations, visiting the Library’s Academic Integrity page, or talking to your professor. If you’re in your first semester, be sure to complete the Academic Integrity Module assigned to you in Blackboard.

Check in with the Library and Learning Services team for more help.

Generative AI and Academic Integrity

Generative A-I tools, such as Chat GPT, DeepSeek, Gemini and Claude are easily accessible. With the ability to quickly generate text, images, video and more, these tools are changing the way we think about content creation, work, and academic assignments. If a generative A-I tool can create things so quickly, why bother doing it yourself?

At Georgian College, you are expected to complete all academic work with integrity. Your professors create assignments that will help you develop skills like critical thinking and time management, while meeting the learning outcomes of your course.

Some programs have learning objectives that also prepare you to meet provincial and professional standards in the field you’ll work in after graduation. Regardless of your program, your future employer expects that you’ve learned the curriculum specified to prepare for jobs in your field. If you use Generative A-I tools when you’ve been asked not to, you miss out on valuable opportunities to build the skills and knowledge you’ll need in the workplace.

Approaches to using generative A-I in workplaces vary. Some organizations are using A-I tools freely, while others may restrict employees from using anything but specific tools. In some work environments, privacy concerns outweigh the benefits and A-I tools are strictly forbidden. So why doesn’t everyone just use Generative A-I, when it seems so much faster?

While generative A-I tools are changing the way we work, learn, and create, they come with a significant number of tradeoffs. Some Generative A-I tools consume significant resources, posing environmental concerns. A-I tools trained largely on internet content will generate outputs that replicate any biases present in the training data, which may be problematic in your research or for the company you work for. Most generative A-I tools ingest all of the information you give them and incorporate it into the system. This includes your personal data, preferences, and information you provide when you sign up on the system’s website, as well as anything you ask, upload or share with the tool. While some tools offer a free-to-use model, they often don’t provide full access unless you pay for a subscription, creating issues of equitable access.

What about using Generative A-I tool for research? In some cases, a Generative A-I tool could be helpful for brainstorming and starting points. But many of the tools accessible for free on the web fail to properly acknowledge their sources. They often fabricate plausible sounding facts, data, and information. If you ask for sources, the tool will create a fake source that may sound real. Using these tools without your professor’s permission, and without careful evaluation of the output can result in a breach of academic integrity. You are responsible for what you hand in – including any issues the tool may have created for you.

There are also copyright and intellectual property issues with many large Generative A-I training sets. If the system can’t reliably cite the source of the information generated, it may also be violating the copyright of content creators and using the intellectual property of artists and organizations without their consent. If you provide the system with information from your professor’s course materials, your textbook, sources from the library, or workplace documents, you could be violating copyright!

To use generative A-I tools ethically in your schoolwork, start by determining which tools your professor allows. Check your course syllabus, information in Blackboard and the assignment itself to determine if you are permitted to use A-I tools. Still not sure? Check with your professor to clarify any expectations. Make sure you properly cite the tool you use, and check its output carefully to avoid academic integrity issues.

Need more help? Check in with the library and learning services team!

Cite your sources - what does it all mean?

Plagiarism occurs in your writing when you use the words, ideas, data, or information from one or more sources incorrectly. Plagiarism is a breach of academic integrity and can result in serious consequences. How do you avoid plagiarism and breaches of academic integrity, while ensuring you are using information ethically in your writing?

Cite your sources! You must cite your sources whenever you include any sort of information, data, ideas or words that are not your own in your writing. This includes when you are writing an essay, report, paper, case study OR preparing a visual assignment such as a poster, infographic, brochure or presentation. Citing your sources is an expectation for post-secondary level writing and research.

But what does “Cite your sources” mean? The process of telling your reader where you found your information has many names. You might be asked to acknowledge your sources, cite your sources, back up your argument, provide references, cite, use citations, give credit, integrate sources, provide documentation, or document your sources. That's a lot of different ways to describe one simple idea: whenever you include someone else's concepts, information or words to prepare your own assignment, you must tell your reader exactly where it came from. We do this through a process commonly called “citation”. .

There are several different citation styles, but the American Psychological Association Style (APA style) is the one most frequently used at Georgian. Always check with your professor if you are unsure of the expectations. Wait… What is a source? Any information you use, refer to, or quote in your writing, including: Articles, books, news, websites, reports, images, data, charts, videos, interviews, ideas, blog or social media posts, an image, photo, chart or graph. Anything you find/read/hear/learn on the web, in the library, in a physical book, in class, or from another person could be considered a source. .

Why should I use sources? Sources are used to help support your ideas, claims, or argument in many types of writing. At the post-secondary level, it's not enough to just talk or write about something you're studying or are interested in! Unless otherwise specified, you are expected to support your ideas and writing with credible sources. That's any source based on reliable research and/or knowledge and experience.

How do I cite my sources? In any citation style, there are 3 main ways of using any outside source: summarizing, paraphrasing or quoting. When summarizing and paraphrasing, you consider the original writer's ideas, words and sentences, but explain what they have said using different words and sentences - your OWN words!. You must include a note immediately after your summary or paraphrase that tells the reader where the idea came from. This is called an in-text citation. When you quote, you use another writer's words exactly as they are found in the original source.

You must put those words inside “quotation marks” and include an in-text citation. Regardless of how you use ideas that are not your own, you must cite your sources! If you don't, you have plagiarized, EVEN if you didn't mean to - and this can lead to serious consequences. Citing your sources is a two-step process. To avoid plagiarism, you MUST complete both steps:

1. Add a short note to your sentence or paragraph immediately after you use someone else's information. This note is usually called an in-text citation but may also be called: a parenthetical or narrative reference, or a reference in brackets. Narrative references are also used in signal phrases, which introduce a quote, summary or paraphrase BEFORE it appears in your writing.

2. Add a full listing of the source's information at the end of your paper. This part of the citation is commonly called a reference. Other names for a reference are full citation, reference list or page entry, or bibliography. In APA style, the reference page is the last page of your paper, and you will list all of the information about all sources used in your paper. Each source used in your writing must have an in-text citation AND matching reference page entry to ensure you avoid plagiarism.

Where do I learn how to do this? APA style requires that your in-text citation and reference page entry for each source to be written in a very specific way, including what information is provided, the order it is written in, and what it should look like. Part of your job as a student writer is to learn how to use an APA style guide to properly cite every source you consult. The rules that tell us how to properly cite our sources are contained within the APA Style guide, an actual book published by the American Psychological Association.

Who can help me with this? Many students are unfamiliar with APA citation. Georgian has a lot of resources to help you become confident in using APA style in your writing. The Writing Centre and Language Help Centre help students to develop their writing skills, including APA citation and how to format the document you create. Always check with your professor if you are unclear about assignment requirements or whether to use APA style to cite your sources!

Demonstrating Your Integrity

Academic Integrity can seem overwhelming. Are you concerned you might be suspected of a breach of academic integrity? Worried you might forget to acknowledge a source? Develop good work habits as a strategy for ensuring that you are working with integrity. With some planning, you can complete your work confidently, efficiently, and with the ability to demonstrate your integrity.

Manage Your Time

One of the best ways to maintain academic integrity is to manage your time! Be aware of which assignments are due in each of your classes, and when. Creating a semester plan can help you visualize the weeks of the semester that will be busy. If you already know that 6 projects are due in week 7, you can work ahead, speak with your professors about managing the work, or ask your manager to give you less shifts at work that week. A semester plan sets you up for success as you juggle all of your responsibilities.

Save Versions of Your Work

Starting an assignment? Consider making a new folder, and save versions of your work. Create an outline or a first draft, and save it as a separate file. When you edit, or add-in new sources, save a new version of the file.

Track Changes

Try using the track changes feature in Microsoft Word or Google docs, which provides you with an easy way to show how your work progressed. Having multiple versions of your work will help you demonstrate your integrity to your professor, AND prevent you from losing everything if power or internet outages occur.

Log Your Research Efforts

Doing research? Consider using a word file to create a research log. Note where you searched, and what keywords you used. Within the library's databases, use the save, email and cite buttons to keep a list of resources found. Try using the search history option within Page1+ or Google to capture your research efforts as you go. Save a screenshot of your search history in your assignment folder or paste it directly into your research log. Don’t forget to save your research log in the folder for your assignment!

Colour Code Your Sources

Incorporating sources into your work? Rushing makes you more likely to lose track of sources, take shortcuts, or fail to cite properly, so start early! Try colour coding your notes to distinguish between sources, using different colours for each source, and for your own ideas. Always include full citation information for each source. Don’t use chunks of text from a source without noting exactly where they came from, including quotation marks, authors and page number. Add references as you make notes, and as you write your paper. Do not plan to go back and add them later. You may lose track or run out of time.

Be Transparent

Transparency and consistency are key for completing your assignments with integrity. Cite and reference all of the sources you’ve used. If the use of Generative A-I tools is permitted for an assignment, make sure you cite! Consider making a note of the prompts you used in your notes and drafts. This will help you recreate your work in the event of a file loss or other issue, and demonstrate how you met the assignment requirements.

Did you meet with Language Help, Research Help, the Writing Centre or a tutor? Make a note of these interactions, with the date and time and the name of the person you met. Save email feedback, a transcript of your Research Help chat, or screenshots into your assignment folder for reference. You can also show these to your professor if you need to work through an issue in your assignment.

Double Check

Ready to hand in your work? Double check to make sure you’re handing in the final copy of your work. When uploading to a Blackboard or Turnitin dropbox, make note of the confirmation number or save the submission receipt. It’s always a good idea to navigate away from the dropbox and then return to it to ensure that your file has submitted successfully. If you have concerns, contact your professor!

Need more help? Check in with the library and learning services team for more ideas!