Professional Ethics and Academic Integrity

Engineers, as professionals in a responsible and collaborative field, choose to follow an agreed-upon code of ethics. Examples of such codes can be found at IEEE and ACM. Many engineers work on projects which affect the safety and security of everyday citizens. Just as your professional capabilities in problem solving, analysis, collaboration, and communication start with your training in college, so does your knowledge of and commitment to professional ethics. As Aristotle said, "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit." We encourage you to remember and practice your ethical responsibilities for every class, every assignment, every group project, and every test.
An obvious university application of your professional responsibility is in the area of academic integrity. This is something which the School of Engineering's faculty and staff take very seriously. For example, you may be disqualified from your SoE major for academic dishonesty. Please review the following statement from The Navigator:

"All members of the UCSC community have an explicit responsibility to foster an environment of trust, honesty, fairness, respect, and responsibility. All members of the university community are expected to present as their original work only that which is truly their own. All members of the community are expected to report observed instances of cheating, plagiarism, and other forms of academic dishonesty in order to ensure that the integrity of scholarship is valued as preserved at UCSC.

In the event a student is found in violation of the UCSC Academic Integrity policy, he or she may face both academic sanctions imposed by the instructor of the course and disciplinary sanctions imposed either by the provost of his or her college or by the Academic Tribunal convened to hear the case. Violations of the Academic Integrity policy can result in expulsion from the university and a permanent notation on the student's transcript.

Students are urged to view the Academic Integrity web site at www.ucsc.edu/academics/academic_integrity.