by Sarah Elaine Eaton
The Alberta Colleges and Institutes Faculties Association (ACIFA) (Alberta, Canada) has released a brand new report on academic integrity. ACIFA’s Position on Academic Integrity, was prepared by Brooklin Schnieder, ACIFA Vice President, Professional Affairs.
This report covers important topics for faculty associations and academic unions and their members, related to academic integrity:
- Faculty members’ role in promoting academic integrity
- Academic integrity and workload
- Emotional labour and burnout
- Institutional policies and practices
- Curriculum and assessment practices
- Text-matching software and other technology solutions
- Academic file-sharing and copyright
- Contract cheating
- Artificial intelligence
- Equity, Diversity and Inclusion
- Decolonization and Indigenization
The report concludes with a dozen recommendations, framed through the lens of social justice and advocacy, “Faculty are deeply committed to these values, but such a commitment should not come with a corresponding cost of additional unremunerated hours, emotional labour, and burnout. And with technological change, the opportunities for students and faculty to find themselves mired in academic integrity issues will only continue to increase.” (p. 9)
To my knowledge, this is the first report on academic integrity by a faculty association or union anywhere. It is a fabulous document that brings important issues into focus. The report is available to download from the ACIFA website: https://www.acifa.ca/_files/ugd/16fcf0_c98c6fb9f9bc4e4880a9f875d754eb4e.pdf
I acknowledge that I may be biassed in my assessment of this work because I’ve been cheering Booklin on in the background as she meticulously prepared this report. So, in the interest of transparency, I wish to disclose that I know Brooklin personally, as she has also been an active contributor to the Alberta Council on Academic Integrity (ACAI) Contract Cheating Working Group, which I co-chaired with Sheryl Boisvert from 2020 to 2023. Brooklin invited me to review a draft of this report I gladly volunteered my time to do so. Now I am happy to share her work publicly and add a further call to action:
Academic labour unions everywhere have a role to play in ensuring that work relating to academic integrity is fair and equitable for faculty members and in particular, those who are precariously employed. I call on other academic and teachers’ unions to produce their own reports to support their members in their efforts to uphold integrity in educational institutions.
Please share this report widely within your networks.
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Sarah Elaine Eaton, PhD, is a faculty member in the Werklund School of Education, and the Educational Leader in Residence, Academic Integrity, University of Calgary, Canada. Opinions are my own and do not represent those of the University of Calgary.
Posted by Sarah Elaine Eaton, Ph.D. 
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