TDNet Discover

The purpose of this qualitative study was to analyze how four-year public and private not-forprofit higher education institutions in Florida address responsibility, approach, and context in publicly available institution-level student academic integrity policies. For the utility of defining the dataset in this study, student academic integrity policies encompassed texts that explained how an institution viewed and addressed student actions that demonstrated or failed to demonstrate academic integrity, academic honesty, or academic dishonesty, these were variously named policies, procedures, codes of conduct, or honor codes. This study’s conceptual framework combined Bretag et al.’s five-element model of exemplary academic integrity policy with a long-standing three-part policy framework and Cooper et al.’s four dimensions of educational policy theory to contextualize policy language within larger institutional structures. This study answered the primary research question How do four-year public and private not-forprofit higher education institutions in Florida address responsibility, approach, and context in publicly available student academic integrity policies? Institution-level policies collected from the public-facing websites of 85 four-year public and private not-for-profit higher education institutions in Florida were analyzed through qualitative context analysis. Punitive approaches and combinations of educative and punitive language were most often used. Responsibilities for academic integrity were defined and distributed in widely varied ways, supported by varied levels of adaptation to a contemporary context. Overall, several distinct patterns of approach, responsibility, and contextual adaptation remained discernible within extensive variation.