Academic Work Consequences:
Visual plagiarism is in violation of Ringling College of Art + Design's Academic Integrity statement.
Ringling College of Art and Design recognizes that scholarly and creative work does not occur in a vacuum but rather emerges from students’ complex connections and experiences with life and with the intellectual and artistic world. Academic integrity is the process of openly acknowledging the sources of one's ideas and creations in the building of one's personal and public identity as a practitioner in the artistic community.
Violations of Academic Integrity Defined
Examples of violations of academic integrity may include but are not limited to:
- Cheating: Taking credit for another person’s work, or allowing another person to take credit for one’s own work; using study or test-taking aids not permitted by the instructor or copying the work of another test taker; using commercial term paper companies or ghostwriters; submitting the same work for credit more than once without prior approval of the instructor(s).
- Copying, imitating, or appropriating in whole or in part another person or persons’ work without appropriate attribution.
- Plagiarism: Attributing to oneself the work of another person or persons.
- Fabrication: Falsification or invention of source material; altering audio, visual, or data files without appropriate notice of the alterations.
- Failure to follow attribution policies or citation practices advocated by the course
instructor and/or described in the syllabus or other course materials.
- Reproducing and/or publicly distributing or posting electronically copyrighted or otherwise protected intellectual property without permission of the owner of rights to that intellectual property.
- Impeding the work of other persons by giving false or misleading information, stealing, or deliberately misplacing or destroying materials.
- Facilitating or abetting violations of academic integrity by others.
Academic Integrity Policy Penalties as Levied by the Academic Standards Committee:
- Teachable Moment (provided by the Faculty Member and/or members of the Sub Committee)
- Failure of the assignment (imposed by the Faculty Member)
- Failure of the course (imposed by the Faculty Member)
- Official Reprimand (A letter of reprimand from the VPAA or designee)
- Academic Probation (period of time based on severity of violation and existence of past violations) (imposed by the Sub Committee and ratified by the VPAA or designee)
- Academic Suspension (period of time based on severity of violation and past violations) (imposed by the Sub Committee and ratified by the VPAA or designee)
- Other suitable action, including counseling, community service, or other reasonable action (may be imposed by the Sub Committee and ratified by the VPAA or designee)
- Complete a workshop on appropriate best practices for avoiding plagiarism or academic ethics with either a Ringling College Librarian and/or an Academic Resource Center staff member (imposed by the Sub Committee and ratified by the VPAA or designee)
- Expulsion from the College (imposed by the Sub Committee, ratified by the VPAA or designee and President).
The same penalties may apply to currently enrolled students for Academic Integrity offenses committed outside of a degree program course structure, such as submitting plagiarized or falsified work for competitions and exhibitions.
These penalties are cumulative to the extent that they are not contradictory. That means that multiple penalties may be levied against a student. For example, a student may fail the course and be required to complete a workshop on appropriate best practices.
Professional Consequences: Copyright Infringement & Law
As part of a final judgment or decree, the court may order the destruction or other reasonable disposition of all copies or phonorecords found to have been made or used in violation of the copyright owner’s exclusive rights, and of all plates, molds, matrices, masters, tapes, film negatives, or other articles by means of which such copies or phonorecords may be reproduced.
Actual damages & profits – monetary
Statutory Damages – sums no less than $750 or more than $30,0000. Not more than $150,000
Additional Damages – two times the license fee for time of the proceeding and up to three years.
Costs & attorney fees paid to the plaintiff
