One of the biggest initiatives the Honor Committee focused on this semester was outreach, not just toward students but faculty as well. In addition, the Committee changed its investigations procedures resulting in shorter investigation time periods.
Committee Chair Ben Cooper cited the Committee's improvements in its outreach efforts as one of its most significant accomplishments. The Committee worked to improve its orientation sessions for first-year and international students. "Dorm talks" were held in smaller and more personal groups, which facilitated discussion and generated more feedback, Cooper said.
"That was a huge accomplishment," Vice Chair for Education Allie Moore said. "First-years got a better grasp of honor in a more intimate setting."
Hoping to reach a different population of the University, the Committee created a program to fulfill the liability standard of the fraternal order agreement for the Greek community. The program covers academic integrity, conscientious retractions and the basic philosophy of the honor system and includes case studies specific to the Greek community. Nearly 30 percent of University graduates are involved in Greek life, allowing the Committee to reach out to a larger number of upper class students. The Committee presented five FOAs this semester, Moore said.
"It's a way to increase relevancy of the system," Moore said. "The FOA program is a great starting point to reach upperclassmen students."
Students, however, were not the only ones targeted by outreach efforts. Honor also sought to reach out to faculty through the creation of flexible exams. The implementation of flexible exams would allow professors to administer an exam during a time period of their choice through Collab, the new course informational system that will replace Toolkit by 2009. With the new system, students would have the option of taking the exam anywhere they desired, rather than having to report to a classroom. Professors would then receive flexible exams on a rolling basis allowing more ease in grading.
According to Cooper, the Committee presented the Faculty Senate with the idea of flexible exams in November. Between 10 to 15 professors said they were interested in administering a flexible exam next semester.
Aside from increased outreach efforts, the Committee also saw a significant decrease in the length of investigations after altering its investigations process in December of last year. The average length of investigation for cases reported after Jan. 17, 2007 decreased from 50.68 days to 24.89 days. This decrease is due to many transformations including the rescheduling of the Investigative panel, which now meets on the first day of investigation instead of waiting until the investigation has been completed.
Vice Chair for Investigations Linda Liu said because the investigations are significantly shorter, the accused student is under less stress as he or she find out sooner the results of the investigation.
Before the transformations, both the reporter of the honor offense and the accused student attended the I-panel, the panel responsible for reviewing the investigation's finding, whereas after neither the reporter nor the accused student attends the I-panel. Liu said this transformation removes any burden from the reporter.
"It benefits both parties," Liu said. "We thought it was very confrontational and unnecessary
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