10/12/2024

If ‘sharing is caring’, then does academic integrity mean not caring?

Written by Alex Jeikner , Fiona Beji, Andriana Athanasopoulou

Alex Jeikner: Does academic integrity mean not caring?

A few days ago, as I was heading toward class, a digital display with a series of slides showcasing the central message of a non-profit foundation which aims to promote kindness caught my eye. The slides depicted what the foundation describes as the six kindness concepts: Respect, Caring, Inclusiveness, Integrity, Responsibility, and Courage. Captivated by the accompanying illustrations of cute bunnies and dogs, I stopped and took the time to look at each slide more carefully – and it struck me how much these resembled the core values of the International Center for Academic Integrity (ICAI): honesty, trust, fairness, respect, responsibility, and courage.

“What a great opportunity”, thought I, always the educator, “I may be able to use this in class! I can explain how academic integrity and kindness are not dissimilar, that they are based on the same principles.” Then, the next slide featured this: “Sharing is caring” – and my budding pedagogical lesson plan began crumbling. Throughout the day, I (ever persistent) wondered, “How far can sharing go, when does sharing become oversharing, how to explain the difference?”

And then came the epiphany: This ‘sharing is caring’ is exactly this year’s theme of the International Day of Action for Academic Integrity (IDOA), “All hands on deck: Making academic integrity everyone’s job”. When we share this responsibility, we care – for academic integrity, for fairness, for mutual respect and for individual effort.

 And to do that, I asked some students to share with us their thoughts. Here they are:

Fiona Beji: How much sharing can be caring?

One of the most widely taught principles that adequately sums up the core of kindness; sharing is caring. Deeply rooted within us from a young age, it is nearly impossible to overlook it and dismiss the sensation - the one that urges you to assist someone in need. College is undoubtedly and inevitably tough, it would be rational to (and on the contrary, irrational not to!) require some form of assistance here and there - from your professors, the heads of your department and certainly, your peers. Countless are the times that I have been asked by a fellow student, to share some personalised notes, or a section of an essay that was graded highly - and though I have been inclined to wholeheartedly offer that assistance, I do feel the obligation to decline. Now, remember the core principle of kindness? Imagine it as a broken record, repeating itself, a background noise -that’s what I hear in my head. It might not disrupt me necessarily, but it’s there. And then I ask myself the question - how much sharing can be caring? And is there a way to show that care, without jeopardizing anyone’s academic career? I believe there is. Communication is key and, in this case, I do think that sharing your thinking process and what you utilized to have a particular result, communicating it properly with your peer, could be a useful and powerful tool. At the end of the day, only so much sharing can be caring, and oversharing can have an adverse effect. It is my own way of saying ‘‘Hey, I care about you enough to share this part of my work with you, but I also care about you enough so that you stay out of trouble, and do even better than I did”

Adriana Athanasopoulou: Is academic integrity a collective act of care?

From my point of view, academic integrity is often perceived as a personal responsibility, but why? What if we switch that idea? What if we start seeing it as a collective act of care? “All hands on deck” is not just a call for action — it is a reminder that integrity in education is not an isolated duty, but a shared one. And if "sharing is caring," then maintaining academic integrity is a community act of care, is it not? When we respect the boundaries of honest work, we are actually caring for something much larger. We take care of the learning environment we all share. It is not about withholding knowledge, but about ensuring that what we share is fair, truthful, and earned.

This idea of integrity as “care” reminds me of my time at the Student Academic Support Services (SASS) as Learning Facilitator. Once, a student came in asking for extensive help on a paper, expecting me to essentially write parts of it for them. While it felt natural to want to provide as much help as possible, I realized that my role wasn't to make the process easier for them by doing the work but rather to guide them in developing their own ideas and skills. Academic integrity meant caring for their growth — which meant giving them just enough support to push their thinking forward without taking over. It was a difficult balance, but by showing the student how to organize their thoughts and improve their writing on their own, I was helping them in a way that would be sustainable in the long run.

When academic integrity is taken seriously by teachers, staff, and students together, we are doing more than just upholding standards — we are building a culture of trust, responsibility, and genuine collaboration. Academic integrity, in this sense, is a deeper expression of concern for one another's intellectual growth rather than a restriction.

Bios

Alex Jeikner is Assistant Professor of literature at the American College of Greece

Fiona Beji. Sophomore. Biomedical Sciences, School of Liberal Arts and Sciences. American College of Greece

Andriana Athanasopoulou is a Sophomore student of Shipping Management, School of Business and Economics. American College of Greece.

The author's views are their own.

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