Authors: Fiona Perry, Dr Anu Sharma, Associate Professor Michelle Cavaleri (Dean, Academic), Margaret Redestowicz, Education Centre Australia Higher Education.
Focus area: Academic integrity education
Education Centre Australia’s Higher Education division (ECA HE) comprises the Asia Pacific International College (APIC), offering business, project management and IT programs; the College of Health Science (CHS), specialising in health management programs; and, the Higher Education Leadership Institute (HELI), delivering eLearning and research programs. While operating as separate institutions, these entities work closely together, leveraging shared staff, resources and knowledge.
Our student body is predominantly international, representing diverse cultural and educational backgrounds from the Indian subcontinent (India, Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh), Africa (Kenya, Ghana, Zimbabwe), South America (Brazil, Colombia, Argentina) and Asia-Pacific (Philippines, Indonesia, China, Fiji), alongside a smaller cohort of domestic students.
These diverse backgrounds can create academic challenges that require targeted support. International students often come from educational systems with different approaches to collaboration, citation and source usage, making it challenging for them to navigate the specific academic integrity expectations and research standards of our institution.
To better support students reported for academic integrity breaches, ECA HE implemented a proactive booking system that automatically offers individual support appointments with learning advisors. These appointments were offered in addition to the usual penalties such as redoing the academic integrity module, resubmitting work and other penalties in line with our Academic Integrity Policy and Procedure. These appointments aim to:
- gain a better understanding of student circumstances that contribute to academic integrity breaches
- provide personalised support addressing specific resubmission requirements and underlying causes to prevent future breaches
- share relevant implications with appropriate stakeholders including unit coordinators, course coordinators and learning designers.
Appointments typically take between 20 and 45 mins and students can pick a time and mode that suits them either online or face-to-face. To set up the appointments we created a new booking system that links to the academic integrity breach database to automate invitations to students who are reported. ECA HE developed training for staff on best practice for conducting appointments. This training covered record keeping, aims and goals of the sessions, tools and techniques that can be used and common challenges, with suggested strategies to overcome these. Furthermore, an example video of a consultation was created. The video is annotated to demonstrate effective strategies advisors can use.
Key lessons or points for implementation
- Students reported for academic integrity breaches frequently require significant training in how to access library resources and websites, and navigate digital platforms such as academic support websites, the learning management system and Turnitin. Academically, students need support building essential skills such as paraphrasing and referencing. Furthermore, students want guidance on the ethical use of generative artificial intelligence (gen AI).
- In relation to wellbeing, students seek support for mental health concerns and assistance with managing health concerns. Students often present to appointments with challenges related to their socioeconomic and personal circumstances, including housing instability, employment pressures and financial difficulties, all of which can interfere with their ability to engage fully in their academic work. Advisors sometimes need to show students how to apply for special consideration and extensions. Staff need to be up to date on what supports are available and how to refer students.
- Staff delivering individual consultations need training on how to best support students. This includes tailoring sessions to individuals and scaffolding and modelling the use of library and academic support resources. These staff also need to be equipped to deal with the multitude of wellbeing issues that can come up when working closely with individual students.
Academic integrity toolkit