An Honor Board was convened in Room 2114 of the Mitchell Building on March 15, 1998 to investigate an alleged act of academic dishonesty in Dr. Brut Cash's HIST 110 course during the spring 1997 semester. Ms. Caesar is charged with violating section 1(a) of the Code of Academic Integrity: cheating. Specifically, it is alleged that Ms. Caesar and another student, Mark Alexander, cheated on a quiz. Ms. Caesar and Mr. Alexander each pleaded not responsible for the act of cheating.
The Honor Board consisted of Paolo Ugolini (undergraduate student), Sin Kei Yeung (undergraduate student), Adam Cohen (undergraduate student), Dr. Ren (faculty), and Dr. Jones (faculty). The Presiding Officer was Sara Atwell and the community advocate was Michael Mann. Also present at the Honor Review were Ms. Julia Caesar (respondent), Mr. Mark Alexander (respondent), Mr. Steve Mile (the respondent's advisor) and Dr. Brut Cash (referring party).
- Ms. Caesar and Mr. Alexander handed in quizzes that had almost identical answers to all three questions.
- a) The first question asked how does one know the date of artifacts discovered in archeological digs. Both students answered that one could tell the date by using Carbon 15 dating process. The correct answer is Carbon 14 dating.
- b) The second question asked the dates of Alexander the Great's empire. The students answered 365 to 332. The correct answer was 356 B.C. to 323 B.C.
- c) The third question asked who was the philosopher/teacher of Alexander the Great. The students answered Socrates. The correct answer was Aristotle.
- The students admitted that their answers were wrong in a very suspicious way, but they said they had a very good explanation. The two students stated that they had spent several hours studying together for the quiz and had studied the wrong dates.
- When asked where the students had found the dates for their answer they could not provide an explanation. When further questioned on this matter, Ms. Caesar admitted that she did not know where the dates came from. Upon further questioning it was determined that Ms. Caesar had copied off of Mr. Alexander.
- Ms. Caesar then stated that she copied off of Mr. Alexander's paper without his knowledge. She apologized for her actions.
Since none of the answers provided by these two students were correct, Dr. Cash was suspicious of the quizzes.
The Board unanimously decided that Ms. Julia Caesar is responsible for an act of cheating, as defined by the Code of Academic Integrity. The Board also unanimously determined that Mr. Mark Alexander is not responsible for violating any section of the Code of Academic Integrity.
The community advocate, Michael Mann, thought that this was a "standard" case. He stated that it was commendable of Ms. Caesar to eventually admit to the act of cheating. He did not, however, regard this as a mitigating circumstance. Therefore, Mr. Mann recommended that Ms. Caesar receive an "XF" for the course.
Ms. Caesar stated she should receive something less than an "XF" for the course. She explained that she was not herself that day. She was having a hard time with her boyfriend and her parents had recently initiated divorce proceedings. She also added that she felt her confession to the act of cheating should be considered a mitigating circumstance.
Dr. Brut Cash felt that Ms. Caesar was a good student. He felt that, considering her apparent stress, it might be best to give her less than an "XF". He stated that he felt she had learned a lesson from this process. But he also added that he felt a little uncomfortable making the recommendation because of his minimal experience in these matters.
The Board unanimously determined to give Ms. Julia Caesar a grade of "XF" for HIST 110 course during the Spring 1998 semester.
The Board agreed with Mr. Mann in regards to this being a "standard" case. The Board appreciated Ms. Caesar finally admitting to the act, but did not see this as a mitigating circumstance. The Board also sympathized with Ms. Caesar as she is going through some trying times, but the Board concluded that she needs to learn from this experience to never take the easy way out, even in hard and trying times.
Respectfully Submitted,
Sara Atwell
Presiding Officer
March 18, 1998
