Academic Misconduct

In University policy, academic misconduct is given a broad definition. Academic Board Regulation s42 states: 

Student academic misconduct is any act or omission by a student that is intended or likely to have the purpose or effect of obtaining for that student or any other person an academic advantage by unauthorised, unscholarly or unfair means, and whether or not the advantage was obtained. Student academic misconduct is serious academic misconduct if it involves one or more significant breaches of the applicable integrity standards.

A central aspect of Academic Misconduct is producing original work and citing any material you have drawn from, including your own past work. It also extends to include other types of unqualified advantage. The University takes academic integrity very seriously.

Researchers and students alike are all expected to be familiar with the University's academic integrity guidelines and maintain a strict adherence to policy. Everyone at the University, from student to researcher, is expected to take individual responsibility for maintaining academic integrity in their work.

Academic Misconduct can include circumstances such as:

• copying someone else’s work
• allowing someone to copy your work
• failing to cite work you have referenced or citing it incorrectly
• forging documents to receive special consideration
• buying or selling essays
• working on an assignment with a fellow student that is not a group-work assignment
• taking unauthorised materials into an exam (This includes materials that are not used or accidently carried into an exam, so exceptional care should be taken to not have these material in your pockets)
• unauthorised or undisclosed use of any technology (including generative AI, paraphrasing tools and translation tools) in assessable work.

Many other situations could be deemed Academic Misconduct. If you have any questions relating to your specific situation, please contact us. 

There are several differences between Level 1 and Level 2 allegations. The first difference is that Level 1 allegations are considered low-moderate breaches of academic integrity rules, while Level 2 allegations are for serious academic misconduct. The University’s website provides further information on what sorts of breaches fall into each category.

The other key difference is that Level 1 allegations are managed and heard by a single Faculty Academic Integrity Officer, while Level 2 allegations are heard by a full Student Academic Misconduct Committee.

There are also different penalties that can be considered by the Faculty Academic Integrity Officer or Student Academic Misconduct Committee, depending on whether the breach falls into Level 1 or Level 2. These penalties are outlined in Schedule 1 of the policy.

It should be pretty easy to identify this by reading over the formal allegation notice you would have received from your faculty. For Level 1 allegations, your allegation notice will state a ‘Faculty Academic Integrity Officer’ will be in charge of hearing your case. Under the possible outcomes section, it will say that if the allegation is upheld, penalties will be decided in line with the Level 1 allegations listed in Schedule 1.

For Level 2 allegations, the allegation notice will state your case is being heard by a full Student Academic Misconduct Committee, and it may also refer to penalties specific to Level 2 allegations as set out in Schedule 1.

If you have repeated breaches of academic misconduct on your record, a further Level 1 allegation may be considered serious academic misconduct and follow the process of being heard by a full Student Academic Misconduct Committee as a Level 2 allegation.

There are a number of reasons you could be asked to an informal meeting without receiving a formal allegation of misconduct.

One purpose of an informal meeting can be to help educate students about academic integrity rules. For example, subject coordinators have the authority to identify an incident of "poor academic practice", where they can implement an ‘educative’ response, which could result in you being advised on correct referencing techniques, or to complete some learning materials on academic integrity. You may also be asked to revise and resubmit work after fixing minor issues with referencing or citations. These are all supposed to be helpful, educative, tools to help you avoid serious issues in the future.

You may also be asked to attend a meeting where you’re not told very much about what you're going to be discussing, which can be a bit scary. These kinds of meetings may be called because staff may see a possibility that there has been a misunderstanding that you could potentially clarify, or they may suspect you have done something not quite right and they want to know more. Meetings like this should be focussed on staff trying to understand more fully what has happened so they can decide what they might need to do in response. These conversations need to be fair and polite and ultimately are designed to try and help you understand academic integrity rules clearly.

As explained above, the University bears the burden of proof in making a case against you if they think you have breached the rules. There are several ways they can collect enough evidence to support a formal allegation. For instance, they can ask you questions about how you completed your assignment or ask you to show how you came about a particular answer. However, they are not permitted to search for incriminating information from you or ask you leading questions about academic misconduct to help them build their case against you. This includes asking you to confess information for fear of things becoming much worse if you don’t comply.

During the course of an informal meeting, if it appears that deliberate and significant Academic Misconduct has occurred, the teaching staff must end the meeting and inform you that they intend to pursue a formal allegation. Informal meetings cannot be used as substitutes for proper, formal hearings. No penalties for misconduct can be applied as a result of an informal meeting. Only after a matter is formally heard by a formal committee/faculty academic integrity officer, and a student has been given the chance to respond in writing and attend the hearing, can it be decided whether you have committed Academic Misconduct or not. If they form this view, only then can any penalties be applied.

It is important that you know that anything discussed at a meeting of this kind could be used to formalise an allegation of misconduct against you. We suggest you ask some more questions to help you prepare. It can certainly be alarming to receive an email asking you to attend a meeting when you don’t know what it is about. Rest assured, you are absolutely within your rights to request more information before you turn up.

Yes - cases of poor academic practice, including record of any outcome or educative response given will be recorded on your internal University file. This is not the same as your academic transcript, and therefore this record won’t be accessible to any parties outside of the University.

The short answer is no - records of poor academic practice are only considered at the initial stage of the academic misconduct process, where a faculty case manager is doing an initial review of a report of a potential academic integrity breach. Records of previous poor academic practice is one of several factors the case manager considers when determining whether the case will proceed to a formal allegation of academic misconduct.

A previous record of poor academic practice is not taken into account when deciding on penalties for formal academic misconduct allegations.

Reports of potential academic integrity breaches are received by a faculty case manager or a central case manager, who must undertake a preliminary review of the suspected breach in order to determine the category of the suspected breach, whether it is likely to constitute a Level 1 or Level 2 offence, and whether to proceed with a formal allegation of academic misconduct.

You may also be invited to an informal meeting with a faculty case manager, where they will ask you to respond to any concerns they have with your assignment. If this happens, make sure to ask via email and before the meeting the following questions:

• what the purpose of the meeting is,
• what the scope of the meeting is, and
• which parts of the policy relate to the reason the meeting if being called.

You should usually hear back about what will happen next within 10 working days of the matter being brought to the attention of the relevant case manager. This will be sent to your official university email account or last known email address.

When you receive a formal allegation of academic misconduct, you should receive an allegation notice that includes the following:

• a clear outline of the nature of the misconduct
• all evidence relating to the allegation must be attached (this may be a copy of your assignment with problematic sections highlighted, a copy of the incident report made by the exam invigilator or the like)
• an opportunity to respond in writing, as well as an invitation to attend a hearing, and specific timelines for these responses
• inclusion of, or reference to, the penalties that can be applied under Academic Board Regulation Part 9 and the Student Academic Integrity Policy.

We strongly recommend that you respond to the allegation in writing and attend your hearing.
As of January 2025, the University categorises allegations of academic misconduct into two categories, either Level 1 or 2 allegations. Depending on what category your allegation falls into, your case will be dealt with slightly differently.

We recommend you respond to the allegation in writing and attend the hearing, as this really does give you the best chance at thoroughly explaining your side of the story. You need to let your Faculty know how you intend to respond within 5 business days of receiving the allegation notice. This is simply the timeframe for you to notify them of whether you intend to respond in writing and/or in the hearing.

From there, you should start putting together your written submission. Your written submission should set out your version of events and detail any exceptional circumstances that you feel should be taken into consideration. It should respond to each aspect of the allegation outlined by the University. We encourage you to use our template - you can download it here.

Your written submission will be due 2 days before the hearing is scheduled, so make sure you check your allegation notice or respond to the allegation notice email to find out when your hearing will take place.

Level 1

If the allegation of misconduct is categorised as Level 1, your case will be heard by a Faculty Academic Integrity Officer. This will be a senior member of academic staff, appointed by the dean, and they will act as the single decision-maker on your case.

Level 2

Alternatively, if the allegation of misconduct is categorised as Level 2, your case will be heard by a centralised Student Academic Misconduct Committee.

This committee at the hearing should consist of two senior academics (one of whom will act as Chair) and a student representative. For undergraduate students, this student representative must be the President of UMSU or their nominee, and for graduate students, it must be a nominee of the President of the Graduate Student Association (GSA).

In both Level 1 and Level 2 hearings, you will be given an opportunity to discuss your account of the situation in greater detail. You should highlight the key points you made in your written submission. The Faculty Academic Integrity Officer or Student Academic Misconduct Committee will also ask whatever questions deemed relevant to the investigation, and you should answer them truthfully.

Following consideration of an allegation of student academic misconduct, the Faculty Academic Integrity Officer or Student Academic Misconduct Committee, having regard to the evidence and on the balance of probabilities, must either dismiss the allegation or uphold the allegation in whole or in part. If the allegation is upheld, penalties may be applied consistent with the Academic Board Regulation Part 9 and the Student Academic Integrity Policy.

You should receive an outcome notice within 5 business days of the hearing that includes the decision to uphold or dismiss the allegation, any penalties imposed, and information about how to appeal the decision. You then have 20 business days to submit an appeal if you wish. Please get in contact with us if you would like advice on lodging an appeal.

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The University has recently published more advice around the use of generative AI tools, which we recommend you read thoroughly here.

The rules around using generative AI tools in assignment writing boils down to whether you are authorised to use these tools in a particular subject, and whether you are acknowledging your use of them. It is considered a breach of academic integrity rules to use generative AI tools to generate content for your assignment that you pass off as your own ideas/work. This is outlined in the University’s statement on the use of artificial intelligence software in the preparation of material for assessment.

Broadly speaking, it’s safe for us to say that using generative AI tools, such as Chat GPT, to help you generate content for part or all an assignment, and then not acknowledging your use of this tool and passing the content off as your own thoughts/ideas, is against the University’s academic integrity rules.

In any case, individual subject coordinators will have different rules on using generative AI tools in their subjects, so you should reach out to your subject coordinator to discuss this for each of your subjects. You should also ask them about the rules around using other AI tools to help you edit your work, such as editing tools like Grammarly or translation software.

In all cases, any use of AI tools in assignments needs to be acknowledged, as per the advice published on the University’s website here.

The University has published information on its use of the Turnitin AI Writing Detection Tool, which you can read about here.

As you will see, the University is still performing tests on the accuracy of the Turnitin AI detector, as they have acknowledged that sometimes the tool incorrectly identifies assessments as being AI generated.

The University doesn’t seem to have any plans to stop using the Turnitin AI detector anytime soon, but there are some ways you can show your working on an assignment if it is flagged in Turnitin as being AI generated.

We recommend that you keep copies of all your drafts, planning notes and referencing notes when you are writing your assignments, to show your process of planning, researching and writing the assignment. This will help you to show that the assignment is your own work in case it is flagged as AI generated in Turnitin.

The University defines submitting falsified or fraudulent information as a breach of academic integrity referred to as ‘Academic Fraud’, which includes (but is not limited to) submitting forged or falsified medical certificates or academic transcripts, or falsely claiming an identity, professional experience or a prior qualification. The University takes these academic integrity breaches very seriously, as they can constitute fraud under Australian law.

The University has powers to verify any supporting documentation that is submitted by students, which is done by contacting the source of the documentation (eg: health professional or education provider) to verify its authenticity. Supporting documentation may be randomly selected to be verified, or the University may choose to check supporting documentation if they notice any inconsistencies.

We understand that students often experience stressful personal circumstances during their studies, and that decision making skills can be impacted in times of stress. If you have submitted a falsified document to the University and received an allegation of Academic Misconduct due to suspected academic fraud, you should get in contact with us here, as we can provide tailored advice on how to frame your response.

We most commonly see cases of academic fraud come up within the Special Consideration process and the admissions process at the University. Common forms of academic fraud that we see include:

• Changing the dates on medical certificates/HPR form that has been filled out by a health professional to fit the dates needed for a Special Consideration application.
• Adding or changing information to HPR forms about your circumstances from what the health professional wrote originally.
• Re-using an old supporting letter from a health professional for Special Consideration and changing the dates on the letter so it is more current.

Sometimes, students will submit falsely enhanced academic transcripts for admission into the University. The University does check all the forms you use to show you meet the entry requirements for admission into the course. Any false statements or information, if proven, will result in a student's enrolment being cancelled (no matter how much of the course they've completed!).

If you choose to use an education agent to apply for admission into the University, the University recommends selecting an authorised education agent for your country via their website here.

This is recommended by the University as unauthorised education agents exist who have been known to use fraudulent methods to assist their clients to gain admission into the University. This might include providing false information to enhance a prospective student’s application, such as by providing inaccurate information about the student’s previous studies or altering the student’s academic transcripts to falsely show better grades.

It’s important to use an authorised agent and check any documents that are supplied to the University as part of your admission application. Any fraudulent or inaccurate information that is provided to the University (by a prospective student or third party) as part of an admission application can result in the University withdrawing an offer of admission or cancelling a student’s enrolment if the fraudulent information is discovered after they are admitted.

Otherwise known as contract cheating, this is when a student engages another person to complete an assessment piece (wholly or in part) on their behalf. There doesn’t need to be a payment made to the other party for this act to be considered contract cheating.

It sure is. Outsourcing of assessment is rightfully taken very seriously by the University, and is treated as a Level 2 breach of academic integrity rules. If you are found to have engaged in outsourcing/contract cheating, you will be at serious risk of suspension or expulsion from your course.

Not only that, you are also putting your future at risk, as a finding of this kind made against you can impact your employment opportunities.

Don't do that! Even if you think you are just helping someone in need, producing work for someone else means you are a party to assessment outsourcing/contract cheating, and you will be in breach of academic integrity rules.

There’s a lot of scammers out there, so be wary of anyone advertising themselves as a ‘tutoring service’ or ‘assignment/exam support’ service. If someone is offering to provide you with answers to an assessment task, or to complete an assessment for you, don’t go there! You can read more about academic scams here.

You never know how, when or why your work may come under suspicion for a potential breach of academic integrity rules. We all know the Turn-It-In AI detection tool is unreliable, and examiners’ suspicions can be raised by any number of things they might see in a piece of work. That’s why it’s important to keep records on how you approached your assessment, how you researched it, planned it, wrote it and referenced it.

Save drafts, version histories, keep all your notes, keep records of all your reference materials...basically, it’s a good idea to collate all evidence you have of completing the assessment task from the early stages through to submission.

I’m glad you asked! Whenever possible, be sure to capture a record of the electronic submission of your assessment. We are regularly contacted by distressed students who know for certain that they uploaded the correct file just before the submission deadline, but the subject coordinator is saying they have not received anything at all, or they have received the wrong file.

The University basically places sole responsibility on students to ensure correct submission of assessment, and the consequences of a technical glitch or accidental upload error can be significant.

So, take a photo of that correct file that you’re about to upload, or a screenshot of that successful submission notification, something, anything, that will help you to prove that you were submitting the correct file, the correct way, at the right time!

More information on record keeping can be found in the How to: Student page.