Scientific misconduct

Cheating refers to any action or negligence on the part of a student that precludes an accurate assessment of the student’s knowledge, understanding and skills and can take many forms, including: 

• Unauthorized use of information, materials, devices, sources or practices in completing academic activities.
• Copying during an exam that should be completed individually.
• Contract cheating
• Attempting to get academic credit in a way that is dishonest, disrespectful, irresponsible, untrustworthy or unfair.
• Misrepresenting a student’s knowledge and abilities.
• Undermining the instructor’s ability to honestly and fairly assess student knowledge and abilities.

For more information about academic misconduct please see the Rules & Regulations Examination Boards BMS.

Fraud refers to any action or negligence on the part of a student that precludes an accurate assessment of the student’s knowledge, understanding and skills and can take many forms, including: 

• Identity theft
• Manipulating data
• Falsifying data

For more information about academic misconduct please see the Rules & Regulations Examination Boards BMS.

Within the faculty of BMS all programmes have several units of study and modules containing group work. The phenomenon of free-riding behaviour is one of the most negatively side effects of group work. Students finish their units of study or modules by benefiting from someone else’s efforts, in many cases other project group members or fellow students. This behaviour is not desirable and not accepted in an academic environment.

What is Free-rinding bahaviour?

The definition of free-riding behaviour: a student benefits from someone else’s efforts and by doing that, delivers none or a minimal contribution to an assignment that has to be executed by the project group. This student will gain from the positive grading of the group assignment with a low contribution. The contribution in this matter can be knowledge, skills or effort.

Tips to prevent Free-riding behaviour

The examiner can prevent this behaviour in several ways. For example:

• Providing transparent assignments (on complexity, interesting subjects and in challenging ways);
• Providing assignments where the desired achievements are stated (including the distribution of the tasks that have to be done);
• Providing an individual part within the assignment which will be graded individually (for example a peer assessment in which students judge each other on specific subjects or a reflection report);
• Warn students in advance that if there are reasons to deviate from a group result grading, individual grading will be possible;
• During the process the project groups should on a regular basis discuss the group process

Possible actions:

• Give the student a lower grade than the other group members
• Report the behaviour to the examination board
• Give the student a new or complementary assignment

Forgery is a criminal act that takes place when a person falsifies something with the intent to deceive another person or entity. E.g. altering a writing with the attempt to defraud another person or entity, the production of fake works that a person claims are genuine, fabricating or the act of devising, fabricating, or counterfeiting a document.

For more information about academic misconduct please see the Rules & Regulations Examination Boards BMS.

Plagiarism is a particular kind of cheating/fraud, which occurs when the student uses someone else’s work or previous work of their own, without correct referencing. This includes, but is not limited to:

a.       copying or using (parts of) other people's work or AI (original terms, ideas, results or conclusions, illustrations, prototypes) and presenting it as one’s own work; in addition using parts of another text (printed or digital), work generated by AI or previous work of their own without referencing (also if minor changes have been made), is considered to be plagiarism;

b.       using visual and/or audio materials, test results, designs, software and program codes without  referencing, and presenting that as one’s own original work;

c.        using verbatim citations without clear referencing or without a clear indication of quotation (e.g., by omitting quotation marks, indentation, empty lines, etc.) and thereby creating the false impression that (part of) these citations is/are one’s own original work;

d.       referring to literature that one has not read oneself (e.g. using references taken from someone else’s work);

e.       using texts that have been written in collaboration with others without explicitly mentioning this to be the case; or having others – paid or unpaid – write texts for you (ghost writing and/or contract cheating);

f.         submitting work that has already been published in whole or in part elsewhere (e.g. work from other courses or educational programmes), without references to the original work.

For more information about academic misconduct please see the Rules & Regulations Examination Boards BMS.

Notification form for plagiarism

Tort/unlawful act is acting or not acting, contrary to the regulations or contrary to norms and values. E.g. making pictures during the reviewing of a test, scolding/disrespecting someone (e.g. a teacher, examiner or invigilator).

For more information about academic misconduct please see the Rules & Regulations Examination Boards BMS.