The student must have been suspicious because she decided to turn in a different paper rather than revise the second one. Like the first one, the student plagiarized the second paper. However, I was able to document the plagiarism on the second paper and therefore the student failed the course for academic dishonesty.

At the classroom level, the college has no formal procedure to let inform a student that action is being taken against them for academic dishonesty. However, because there is an established procedure for students to contest a grade—a procedure that students are eager to use—it is important that members of the faculty can document any charges. Simply “knowing” that the student cheated is not good enough.

In my syllabus, I do outline the procedure I will use if a student is guilty of plagiarism or other forms of academic dishonesty. After writing that students who are guilty of plagiarism and other forms of academic dishonesty will fail the course, I continue:

Because academic dishonesty violates the Schoolcraft College Student Code of Conduct, I will also forward the name of any student guilty of plagiarism or other forms of academic dishonesty to the Dean of Student Services so that she can determine if additional disciplinary action is warranted.

My experience is that the procedure of forwarding student names to the Dean has more impact than to just tell students that they will fail the course for cheating.