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Student Code of Conduct Expectations of Behavior and Academic Dishonesty

(Excerpts from the Massachusetts Community College Student Code of Conduct, issued: April 2008, revised: September 1, 2010, revised: April 12, 2016, revised: February 18, 2020, Revised September 1, 2025 – Section 7 and Section 8.)

Section 7: Expectations of Behavior

A. Core Values and Behavioral Expectations

As a public institution of higher education, which is committed to student access and success, the College maintains the following Core Values and Behavioral Expectations of its students.

  1. Integrity. Students are expected to exemplify honesty, honor, and a respect for the truth in all of their dealings.
  2. Community. Students are expected to positively contribute to the educational community.
  3. Safety. Students are expected to choose behavior that is conscious of the rights and safety of others and the community and promotes a productive and diverse academic environment.
  4. Responsibility. Students are expected to accept responsibility to themselves, to others, and to the community.
  5. Communication. Students are expected to engage in honest, and productive communications with members of the College community to foster an environment of mutual respect.

B. Code of Conduct Violations

The College considers the following behaviors as inappropriate for the College community and in opposition to its core values and behavioral expectations. These expectations apply to all students and student organizations. The College encourages community members to report all incidents of such behavior. Any student or student organization found to have committed or to have attempted to commit any of the following misconduct is subject to the sanctions outlined under this Policy.

2. Academic Dishonesty. Acts of academic dishonesty, including but not limited to the following:

  1. Cheating. Intentional use, and/or attempted use of any unauthorized assistance in any academic exercise including, but not limited to, unauthorized use of generative artificial intelligence (generative AI) or dependence upon the aid of sources beyond those authorized by the instructor.
  2. Fabrication. Intentional and unauthorized falsification and/or invention of any information or citation in any academic exercise.
  3. Unauthorized Collaboration. Deliberately submitting work prepared collaboratively with someone else without explicit permission from the instructor.
  4. Unauthorized Distribution of Course Materials. The sharing or distribution of course materials, course content, quizzes, exams, essays, and other assignments, including but not limited to posting to an online medium or study aid website or online academic warehouse (e.g., Course Hero, Chegg, Study Bible, etc.), without the express permission of the faculty member.
  5. Facilitating Dishonesty. Knowingly helping or attempting to help another commit an act of academic dishonesty, including students who substitute for other persons in examinations or represent, as their own, papers, reports, projects, or the academic works of others.
  6. Plagiarism. Knowingly representing the words, ideas, or artistic expression of another as one’s own work in any academic exercise, including but not limited to unauthorized resubmission of previously-submitted assignments for which the student has earned credit, copying other’s work, and patchworking source material and representing the work as one’s own.
  7. Submitting, in whole or in part, prewritten term papers of another or the research of another, including but not limited to commercial vendors who sell or distribute such material.
  8. Theft of materials. The acquisition, without permission, of tests or other academic material belonging to a member of the faculty or staff, or another student.
  9. Testing Procedures: Failure to follow testing procedures as outlined by college personnel including faculty, other staff, and third-party proctors.
  10. Academic Fraud. Misrepresenting one’s own academic work including but not limited to: purchasing other’s work, arranging for others to do work under a false name, and hiring a proxy or other third party to complete coursework on one’s behalf.

Section 8: Student Conduct Procedures

C. Discipline for Academic Dishonesty

This Policy recognizes the right of faculty to manage their class, including addressing directly with students issues of academic dishonesty. When there is information that academic dishonesty occurred, a faculty member may choose to take action as outlined in the course syllabus, including issuing a failing grade for the assignment or the course. Faculty are encouraged to share that information with the Code of Conduct Administrator (CCA). If the CAA is aware of more than one incident of academic dishonesty by this student, in addition to the issuance of a failing grade by the faculty member, the student may be subject to disciplinary action under this Policy. If the student believes that there is substantial evidence of error or injustice associated with a failing grade issued because of academic dishonesty, the student may file a grievance under the Student Grievance Procedure’s Grade Appeal Process.

Where the issuance of a failing grade by a faculty member for academic dishonesty will result in a student’s dismissal from a program (for example in nursing and other health care programs), the charge of academic dishonesty shall be directly referred to the CCA for administration under this Policy, which shall be completed, where practicable, within thirty (30) days.

Please see the Student Code of Conduct for information on this policy and procedures for disciplinary actions for academic dishonesty.