For the past two years, the Academic Integrity Committee (AIC) has been reviewing Middlebury’s Honor Code, bringing students, faculty and staff into the process. Dean of Students Joe Russell announced the results of this review process in November.
One change includes adjusting the default punishment of suspension to a range of sanctions based on the severity of the honor code violation. This amendment was ratified by a student vote conducted last fall, and was then confirmed by a faculty vote.
Other changes that passed required only faculty approval. Those adjustments are explicitly incorporating generative artificial intelligence (AI) into the definition of plagiarism, requiring prior approval for students to reuse work when repeating a course and updating basic language for inclusivity and accuracy.
Out of the three changes that the AIC proposed to be voted on by both students and faculty, only one, adding a range of sanctions, received sufficient votes from both groups.
Students voted against allowing faculty to proctor examinations, with only 45.8% of voters supporting the idea. While students voted 73.5% in favor of removing the moral obligation for students to report honor code violations, the faculty then voted it down, with only 15.5% in favor. The AIC believes that the two outcomes were linked. Many faculty believed that removing the moral obligation would undermine unproctored exams.
“Faculty pointed out that even if students choose not to report honor code violations, it is important to be clear that the right thing to do is to report,” the AIC wrote in a joint statement to The Campus. The current AIC consists of Professor of English Timothy Billings, Professor of Education Jonathan Miller-Lane and Professor of Economics Obie Porteous.
“Although two of the changes we proposed based on this input did not end up passing the required student and faculty votes, we feel like the process did generate a lot of helpful attention to and discussion of academic integrity that will help strengthen the culture of academic integrity on campus going forward,” the AIC wrote.
The student vote on allowing faculty proctoring was more divided. While almost half of students voted in favor, a few more worried that more proctoring would undermine trust.
“Many students felt that cheating is more of a problem on take-home exams and assignments rather than on in-person, unproctored exams,” the AIC wrote.
In his email to students announcing the results, Joe Russell wrote that the AIC has drafted “guidelines for faculty for administering in-person exams to help promote more consistent and equitable practices across the college.”
Students largely agreed upon the decision to adjust a range of sanctions for honor code violations, with 89.2% voting yes.
“Being punished for unintentional plagiarism during a very stressful time of your academic career, in a place where you’re still learning the consequences, strong disciplinary action seems over the top,” Sarisa Techasukij ’28 said. “Allowing the student to understand the consequences of those actions were they to happen in a different setting is the most vital part.”
Faculty agreed, with 77.8% voting in favor, though some expressed concern that sanctions might become too lenient to deter cheating. To address these concerns, the AIC drafted proposed sanctioning guidelines outlining three tiers of violations and associated penalties. The committee plans to continue reviewing these guidelines annually.
AI usage was a major theme in the review process. Overwhelmingly, the faculty approved incorporating uncited AI usage into the definition of plagiarism, with 98.2% voting yes. Still, with rapidly shifting AI technology, the AIC hopes to continue discussing AI policy.
“The review committee’s interim report made several other recommendations, including developing examples for students on appropriate versus inappropriate use of AI, continuing to monitor development in AI technology, and adapting the types of assessment that faculty use for student work,” the AIC wrote.
Professor of Linguistics and Arabic Usama Soltan suggested that returning to written exams would help students rely less on AI since they would be held accountable by the structured setting.
“If all the assignments are done outside of class, then you really don’t know who is benefiting from acquiring knowledge, critiquing knowledge, producing knowledge, working on problem-solving skills — there are all these skills that we target in our classes that some of these technologies can be an easy shortcut for,” Soltan said.
The AIC hopes that this review will continue to spark conversation concerning academic integrity. Though formal Honor Code reviews happen every four years, the Academic Integrity Committee will remain active to discuss a continued culture of transparency.
Rachelle Talbert '28 (she/her) is a News Editor.
Rachelle previously served as a Copy Editor. She intends to major in English with minors in Art History and Linguistics.
