What is integrity? Ultimately it is about acting in a way that represents your ideas, opinions or work and being honest and respectful of the Codes of Ethics and Conduct you might be referring to. How can you demonstrate it in your academic education, in your work and, in general, in your entire life?
If you are a PoliMI student or staff member you have to log in using your Person Code. This is the only way to prove your participation in this course for official recognition.
This course will give you an understanding of the meaning of academic integrity and integrity broadly. You will understand what integrity means and how it is applied in your studies, personal life, professional life, and work. We will show you examples of negative practices when it comes to collaborating with others and working together, as well as examples of good practices in studying and working with others. The course will demonstrate what paraphrasing and referencing mean and how to do this. We will explore different types of assignment styles and academic writing methods. The definition and meaning of the Author's right will be presented. Finally, we will consider the definitions of types of misconduct, giving examples of these types of cheating and explaining the meaning and purpose of the Codes of Ethics and Conduct. We will explain how you can develop your skills by knowing how, where and when to get help, giving you the power to take responsibility for your learning journey.
The MOOC will include different activities for you to read and watch, as well as things for you to do to test your knowledge of the concepts as you move through the lessons. Examples and case studies will allow you to taste how integrity is part of everyday life in the academic context, increase awareness of how you can benefit from staff and institutional support, and walk your learning path accordingly.
Total workload of the course: 25 hours
This MOOC is provided by Politecnico di Milano.
The course is delivered in online mode and is available free of charge.
Course materials will remain available to all enrolled users after the end of the current edition, so they can return to content later. The current course edition will be followed by a new one just after its end.
The course is organised in 4 weeks.
In particular, in week 1, we will define integrity in the context of learning, highlight its importance for professional life, and stress its role at the personal level.
In week 2, we will analyse how to develop academic skills for integrity, such as summarising, paraphrasing and referencing; we will look closely at academic writing skills and assessment styles, and we will see why it is important to understand Copyright and Open Licences.
Week 3 is devoted to defining misconduct, studying skills and how to seek help; we will dive into Polimi’s Code of Ethics and Conduct as an example of the internal norms to support integrity.
Week 4 offers a summary of the course as a whole.
By actively participating in this MOOC, you will achieve different intended learning outcomes (ILOs).
No prerequisite knowledge is required for this course.
By reviewing the content in the form of videos and other web-based resources, you will have the opportunity to discuss course topics and share ideas with your peers in the Forum of this MOOC.
During this MOOC you will find some activities for self-reflection. They are not evaluated and not compulsory, and they are just a stimulus for reflection.
We will also give you links to extra resources if you would like to do any more reading on or around the topic.
The final grade for the course is based on results from your responses to the quizzes you will find at the end of each week (weekly quizzes). You will successfully complete the course if you reach 60% (or more) of the total score by the end of the edition. The course’s total score will be calculated by averaging the scores of the assessed quizzes for each individual week.
The Certificate of Accomplishment will be released to anyone who successfully completed the course by achieving at least 60% of the total score in the assessed quizzes. You will be able to download the Certificate of Accomplishment directly from the website.
Once you have successfully passed the course, you can request the Certificate of Accomplishment without waiting for the end of the edition.
The Certificate of Accomplishment does not confer any academic credit, grade or degree.
EQF Level 5
0031 Personal skills
0223 Philosophy and ethics
The forum of this MOOC is freely accessible and participation is not guided; you can use it to compare yourself with other participants, or to discuss course contents with them.
If you have any enquiries about the course or if you need technical assistance please contact pok@polimi.it. For further information, see FAQ page.
Dr Rebecca Awdry is an Honorary Fellow with the Centre for Research in Assessment and Digital Learning at Deakin University. Her research focus is on academic integrity and the behaviours that threaten integrity. She explores criminological theories to understand student study behaviours. Rebecca is based in Melbourne, Australia.
Viola Schiaffonati is associate professor of Logic and Philosophy of Science at Politecnico di Milano, Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e Bioingegneria. She holds a PhD in Philosophy of Science from Università di Genova. Her research interests are in the philosophy of AI and robotics, the epistemology and methodology of experiments in computer engineering and autonomous robotics, the ethical issues of intelligent and autonomous systems.
Paola Corti is a Project Manager at Politecnico di Milano – METID; she is an instructional designer involved in MOOCs design and production for POK platform. She coordinated the design of the course, involved international testimonials, together with other curators, in order to collect the experiences available in this MOOC, and she kept together the design and the production groups… and many are things needed : ).
This course is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License except where otherwise specified.