Recommendation N.º12/SO/2018

When analysing and reflecting on the complaint made by a student of the Undergraduate Degree in Management, regarding the detection of plagiarism, verified in the group work, “Job analysis/ jog design: a tool at the service of HRM”, in the Curricular Unit of Human Resources Management, briefly described by the following elements: 1. Plagiarism has been detected, based on “Plagiarism Detector v. 976 – Originality Report. Analyzed Document: 28/03/2017 16.53.59”, in accordance with the rules and procedures on Plagiarism in force at the University of Madeira; 2. The Faculty Member of said Curricular Unit detected other situations, not identified in the report, that could be considered plagiarism; 3. One of the students, who was part of the work group, not the complainant, took responsibility for plagiarism; 4. The complainant thinks that the Rules and Procedures on Plagiarism are not sufficiently objective and specific regarding the context of plagiarism; 5. In the evaluation element, group work, students were given a rating of 0.0 (zero); 6. All students of the work group were given the possibility of completing the Curricular Unit in question, regardless of having been penalised with 0.0 (zero), in the group work evaluation element (TG2); The complainant completed the Curricular Unit, Human Resources Management,  with the quantitative assessment of 13 (thirteen).

Thus, in accordance with the elements presented, complemented by the interpretation of the “Student Disciplinary Regulation”, “Disciplinary Procedures”, “Regulation for the Evaluation of Student Learning” and the “Rules and procedures on plagiarism”, the Student Ombudsperson, considering academic integrity as one of the principles, which best maps and identifies the nobility of university status, proposes the following recommendation, broken down into the following ideas:

1. In accordance with the Disciplinary Procedures, "The infractions carried out by members of the academic community within the scope of the University are assessed by the Disciplinary Committee of the Senate", we believe that, within the scope of the responsibilities mentioned above, said Committee should be responsible for triggering the thought process on the degree of coherence, accountability and rationality of the various regulations, rules and procedures that determine decisions;
2. We verified the need for a review of the Rules and Procedures on Plagiarism, especially in Article 5 - Penalties for Plagiarism detected a priori, adjusting and/or introducing, for instance, the possibility of annulment/suspension of one or more assessment elements that refer to the overall assessment of the curricular unit under analysis;
3. In our opinion, students should receive the Rules and Procedures on Plagiarism in digital format at the beginning of the academic year. 

We believe that academic education at the University of Madeira will be more representative of the goals, expectations and personal and collective motivations of the global community if Academic Integrity is proactively preserved and ensured by all parties.