Honor Code may change
By Rachana Dixit, news editor
Posted on January 11, 2007

The Honor Council is considering a policy change in which a notation may appear on a student’s transcript if he or she is convicted of an Honor Code violation.

Senior Kurt Taves, president of the Honor Council, said he thinks such a notation would protect the integrity of a college degree.

“It’s not fair to the people who are working hard and being honest about it,” he said.

The proposed notation would say directly on the transcript that the student received an F in the course because of an Honor Code violation. Taves said currently there is no marking on the transcript that shows a student has violated the Honor Code.

If implemented, the notation would stay on the student’s transcript until a year after they graduate. However, the notation option would only be considered if the student was going through a formal hearing, which occurs about 20 times per year.

Honor Council Coordinator Maggie Evans said the Honor Council and Honor Council Advisory Board have been researching the transcript notation option for a few years because they wanted to find a middle ground when penalizing students. The idea first came about five years ago, when Honor Code violations began to increase slightly.

Evans said, “For the past several years, the Honor Council has received requests from reporting faculty and Honor Council hearing panels that the Code include as a penalty option the potential for transcript notation for some Honor Code violations.”

Taves added, “At least for me, it gives people in hearing panels more options. A lot of our formal cases are those kinds of situations where it’s someone’s first violation. It’s egregious what they’ve done, but suspension is pretty serious.”

Taves said that this summer members of the Honor Council researched 50 to 60 other colleges to see if they had a similar policy in place. He said they discovered that Kansas State University and the University of Maryland are among many universities that have a transcript notation policy.

“A lot of schools had it on there permanently,” he said. but added that JMU was not considering this option. 

Shortly before Winter Break, an e-mail survey was distributed to JMU faculty to gauge if this policy would be well received. Taves said the questions related to the adequacy of the Honor Code, if faculty members were aware of its provisions, and whether a transcript notation would deter cheating. As of Monday, 313 people had responded to the survey, with 75 percent of them believing this notation would deter cheating.  Thirty-seven percent thought the notation should remain on the transcript permanently.

Although faculty and administration have been surveyed, Taves said he is not sure that the entire student body would get to voice its concern on the potential change. He said the Honor Council has considered doing a similar survey with students, but did not think it would get a good response. Instead, the policy change would be presented to SGA, since the student body elected the representatives.

“That’s why SGA is elected,” Taves said. “People go through their elected officials.”

Students have expressed mixed feelings about the transcript notation. Freshman Jhovanna Lopez said she thinks it would be effective.

“I think it’s a good thing because students will think twice about cheating,” she said.

Junior Brian Gotosa did not agree, and thought the punishment would be too harsh on students.

“It ruins your reputation,” he said. “It’s like double punishment. You punish them in college, then you punish them in life.” 

But Taves ensured that a policy like this would not be implemented if there were strong disapproval.

“We don’t want to ruin anyone’s life,” he said. “We’ve been trying to get this to pass for almost four years, but we don’t want to pass something that the student body and faculty doesn’t think is right.”

Evans agreed, saying the time frame for this change to occur is still unknown.

“Much additional work will need to occur before the Honor Council and Honor Advisory Board are prepared to consider a Code change,” Evans said. “It is impossible to predict when, or if, this change will occur.”