Qatar
Students have the power to curb cheating: survey
Students have the power to curb cheating: survey
The results of a recent survey conducted by a group of students and educators at Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU) show that students have the power to reduce cheating. Some 65% of respondents agreed that students can make a change where the situation demands so. |
Over the past year, the group from HBKU, a member of Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development, and its partners has been working to promote academic integrity.
Portraying other’s work as if it is their own, not citing knowledge sources, and consulting peers on assignments that are to be done alone are only three examples of academic integrity violations that peers can discourage by their individual and collective action, according to HBKU.
Following the survey, which included students from some of the country’s most prestigious universities, the group worked with HBKU on a competition to bring about greater awareness of academic integrity. In the competition, students from HBKU partner universities and from the Academic Bridge programme were invited to work in teams and to submit an original creative work to raise awareness about academic integrity. The students’ submissions were then uploaded to Facebook so that other students could see the submissions and vote on the submission that seemed most effective.
Student participants in the competition included Bilal Sheikh and Omar Ashour of Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar; Eman Thowfeek, Salman Ahad Khan, and Ahwaz Akhtar of Georgetown University School of Foreign Service in Qatar; Saad Ahmed Khan and Syed Owais Ali of Northwestern University in Qatar; Nathaniel Tonelli of Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar; and Gabriela Arce and Mustafa Selim of Texas A&M University at Qatar.
The winning submission received 215 votes and featured the tagline “Say no to plagiarism.” The submission was created jointly by Ahwaz Akhtar and Syed Owais Ali.