Honor Code Violation Forum

[lilyyxy]

Hi folks,

I am a prelaw student in grad school now and am going to apply for law school in fall 2019. I have some questions about how my honor code violation in undergrad affects my chance to get in t14 law school and any inputs are appreciated!

I’m now a first year grad student and it happened when I was a freshman in college. The violation happened in my French language class when I was writing a weekly blog. The assignment (about 15 weekly blogs in total) altogether counts for 10% of the course grade. I did not cite one sentence that I paraphrased from Wikipedia in one of my weekly blogs. I came to the US for college as an international student from a totally different educational system so all of this was new to me. The professor was new to the college so she didn’t know the rules and directly contacted the honor board committee before talking to me. I had a few hearings at the committee after writing a letter explaining the situation. The process really threw me off and the experience was pretty traumatized. The committee decided to close the case with "unintentional plagiarism".

My dean told me that it will be a closed file in my profile folder, but the college will give other people access when requested. I don't know in what form this paper exists and how it will affect my chance of getting in T14 law schools. I have a 3.73 gpa (manga cum laude when I graduated), and am aiming at 175 lsat.

Also, a separate question: do law schools ask you to report any kind of academic hearings or only academic dishonesty? I’m not sure how detailed I need to be when writing the addendum because I also went through a academic- racism hearing (one of my professors is a fucking racist), but it didn’t have any negative effects on my academic performance eventually.

I appreciate any inputs provided!

[cavalier1138]

You will need to disclose, but if you just take responsibility for the mistake and note that you haven't had any issues since, I don't see it being an application-killer.

Also, a separate question: do law schools ask you to report any kind of academic hearings or only academic dishonesty? I’m not sure how detailed I need to be when writing the addendum because I also went through a academic- racism hearing (one of my professors is a fucking racist), but it didn’t have any negative effects on my academic performance eventually.

I'm a little confused about this one. Are you saying that you instituted a hearing against the professor? If that's the case, I can't imagine it's responsive to any school's questions. But as always, read the question and provide the requested information.

[QContinuum]

As cavalier says, read the question carefully, and if there is any doubt about whether you need to disclose, err on the side of disclosing. (Of course, if there's no doubt and the question clearly doesn't require disclosure, then don't over-disclose just for the sake of disclosing.) Disclosure usually doesn't bar someone from law school or bar admissions; it's lack of candor that does people in.

[FND]

I am a prelaw student in grad school now and am going to apply for law school in fall 2019

curious about this

[lilyyxy]

You will need to disclose, but if you just take responsibility for the mistake and note that you haven't had any issues since, I don't see it being an application-killer.

Also, a separate question: do law schools ask you to report any kind of academic hearings or only academic dishonesty? I’m not sure how detailed I need to be when writing the addendum because I also went through a academic- racism hearing (one of my professors is a fucking racist), but it didn’t have any negative effects on my academic performance eventually.

I'm a little confused about this one. Are you saying that you instituted a hearing against the professor? If that's the case, I can't imagine it's responsive to any school's questions. But as always, read the question and provide the requested information.

Hi cavalier,

Thanks so much for your response. That gives me much relief as the experience was really traumatized. The racism-academic situation happened later in college when a professor accused me of academic dishonesty but the committee had a few hearings and decided that there was none so the case was dismissed. It doesn't have any record, but I'm afraid that it would look bad if I say anything because people might doubt that I haven't learned the lesson from my first year even though the case was dismissed. My first traumatic experience was due to the fact that the college doesn't actually have coherent rules and clear procedure in terms of this kind of issues. I asked a friend of mine who used to serve on the committee and she said she doesn't think there is a need to disclose this information since there is nothing against me at the end.

[cavalier1138]

You will need to disclose, but if you just take responsibility for the mistake and note that you haven't had any issues since, I don't see it being an application-killer.

Also, a separate question: do law schools ask you to report any kind of academic hearings or only academic dishonesty? I’m not sure how detailed I need to be when writing the addendum because I also went through a academic- racism hearing (one of my professors is a fucking racist), but it didn’t have any negative effects on my academic performance eventually.

I'm a little confused about this one. Are you saying that you instituted a hearing against the professor? If that's the case, I can't imagine it's responsive to any school's questions. But as always, read the question and provide the requested information.

Hi cavalier,

Thanks so much for your response. That gives me much relief as the experience was really traumatized. The racism-academic situation happened later in college when a professor accused me of academic dishonesty but the committee had a few hearings and decided that there was none so the case was dismissed. It doesn't have any record, but I'm afraid that it would look bad if I say anything because people might doubt that I haven't learned the lesson from my first year even though the case was dismissed. My first traumatic experience was due to the fact that the college doesn't actually have coherent rules and clear procedure in terms of this kind of issues. I asked a friend of mine who used to serve on the committee and she said she doesn't think there is a need to disclose this information since there is nothing against me at the end.

Ok, so you were subject to a hearing for academic dishonesty. Whether or not the professor was racist is, unfortunately, irrelevant for the purposes of these questionnaires.

So it will depend entirely on the wording of the application. If the question asks you to disclose all formal accusations/hearings, then you have to disclose the second instance. If it only asks you to disclose actual instances of academic dishonesty, then you don't need to disclose.

Most importantly, I'm sure your friend is well-intentioned, but she is not even remotely qualified to tell you what you do and don't need to disclose with regards to law school and/or bar applications. If the C&F questions on an application ask you to disclose these things, you need to disclose them, even if you don't think you should be required to. And under no circumstances should you try and explain away these instances by claiming the rules weren't clear or that a professor had it in for you. If you have to disclose, just briefly summarize the facts and explain that you learned your lesson (or in the case of the one that didn't result in a finding of academic dishonesty, that the committee cleared you).

[LSATWiz.com]

Most applications only ask for academic disciplinary actions for which you were found guilty while about half ask even ask for criminal charges that were dismissed on the merits. The reason for this is twofold - c&f committees generally care more about criminal actions than academic ones, and largely only care about academic offenses for which you were actually found guilty.

Regardless, you were found guilty of "unintentional plagiarism" so I think it's clear you did suffer some punishment. Two things work in your favor here:

(1) if the charge has the word "unintentional" it is then that it is great, because it suggests your conduct was not dishonest, which is what would be the major red flag about plagiarism.

(2) No adverse action was taken.

The fact the professor was racist is not really relevant to whether you plagiarized or not. I can see racism being a mitigating factor to say some physical altercation if you were heated in the moment, but it doesn't really affect one's intent to plagiarize a paper. Given its irrelevance, mentioning this hurts more than it helps because it comes across as an excuse.

I'd make sure to state that although it was and was determined to be unintentional, you learned to be more careful in the future. I'd also mention that because it was deemed unintentional, no adverse action was taken and it was deleted from your transcript.

[ClubberLang]

This isn't a career killer, but your unwillingness to accept responsibility for what sounds like multiple incidents of academic dishonesty is a bit alarming. Candidly, you don't sound like lawyer material.