Snowball Effect: Impact of Compromised Practices on Higher Education Credibility & Integrity

1. The Snowball Effect of the Impacts of Practices that Compromise Credibility & Integrity of Higher Education C. S. Moyo and A. Saidi Presentation at the Quality Promotion Conference Pretoria 27 February 2019

2. Background Goal of higher education is to produce: • Equipped with requisite knowledge & skills • who are able to respond to socio-economic needs of their countries • who are able to contribute to advancement of technology • who are endowed with human virtues: honesty, respect, responsibility, trust, etc. • who can contribute towards addressing societal challenges

3. Academic Integrity • Academic integrity is about the universal criteria for value-based conduct for students, academics & researchers • It creates the requisite conditions for HE to achieve its intended goals • It is the foundation for quality & credible HE • It is all encompassing and holistic

4. Practices that Compromise Credibility & Integrity of HE • Submission of fraudulent documents for admission • Plagiarism • Cheating during examinations and tests • Abandonment of teaching duties by academics • Staff facilitated corruption • Use of third party services

5. Aim of the Paper To show that the impacts of practices that compromise credibility & integrity of HE are not only experienced by the individuals involved, but that there is a snow ball effect whereby they escalate from the individuals upwards to the national & even global HE systems

7. Impacts on the Individual • Individuals shoulder financial costs, paying bribes or third party services • Well-deserving students can be denied access to HEIs because non-deserving ones (eg those using fraudulent documents, the well connected, those from well to do families) would have taken their place • Individual students and academic researchers’ good images can get tainted because of other people’s dishonest actions • Graduates can fail to get employment because non-qualified ones would have been employed

8. Impacts at class/cohorts level • The good image of the whole class can get tainted because of the actions of some dishonest individuals in that class • Lecturers might develop a bad attitude towards the class that is involved in dishonest practices and the quality of teaching will be compromised • Students from particular institutions might fail to secure employment owing to the bad reputation the class

9. Impacts on institution • Enrolment levels might fall which means reduction of subsidies from governing authorities • Good lecturers might leave the institution and when this happens, the quality of teaching is affected • Throughput rates could fall because good students and lecturers would have left • The good image of an institution can be tainted as disillusioned students and staff leave the institution

10. Impact on economic system • Employing people with compromised competencies affects production in an organization, either in the production of low quality goods or services • Acts of dishonesty might expose other employees to risks such as injury, financial liability for companies producing substandard goods and offering sub-standard services • There can be loss of revenue for the company because of clients shunning their products and services

11. Impacts at society level • Graduates from such institutions might find it difficult to get employment and society will be affected if such graduates start engaging in criminal activities • Taxpayers’ money used for funding universities would not have been properly utilized. Such funds could have been utilised by other social development programmes such as health and social grants. • If HEIs are unable to produce competent thinkers, strategists, economists and the like, then society stagnates

12. Impacts at society level cont’d • If human virtues of honesty, respect, responsibility, trust are not inculcated in students by HEIs, then anti-social behaviours will begin to manifest • When anti-social behaviours get on the increase, society is affected • If HEIs fail to produce quality research innovations and society fails to take advantage of technological development, society lags behind in terms of development

13. Impacts on national higher education system • Higher education institutions might fail to attract international students leading to loss of revenue • Higher education institutions might not be able to get donor funds because of bad reputation • Higher education institutions might lose opportunities for cooperation with other institutions on areas of research and innovation

14. Impacts at global level • Because we live in a global village, what happens in one country has a potential of affecting other countries. If the behavior of some of its citizens is undesirable, other countries will be affected if the dishonest citizens decide to move to those countries • Technology has made it possible for corruption to permeate through borders making countries vulnerable to such practices

15. Conclusion • When individuals breach principles of academic integrity, the effects are far reaching and go beyond just the individuals concerned. • The snowball effect and its magnitude is amplified at each stage, from individuals, class or cohorts, institutions, economic system, society, national higher education system and globally • Therefore, it is important to nip in the bud all practices that are likely to compromise credibility &integrity because dealing with consequences will be too costly.

16. THANK YOU