This report has been posted by the Student-Faculty Honor Committee pursuant to section 1.100(4) of the Honor Code.
On or about April 6, 2018, the Committee approved a settlement agreement negotiated by the accused student and the Prosecutor pursuant to § 1.060(2) of the Code. The charge against the student was that the student violated § 1.020(1)(A) of the Code by engaging in conduct intended to gain an unfair advantage. More specifically, the charge was that the student violated § 1.020(2)(A)(ii) by publically posting on social media a picture of a portion of the student’s exam answer and privately forwarding the same image to at least one student who was also enrolled in the class. During a take-home examination, the student took a picture of the student’s computer screen showing the student’s open Exam 4 window containing approximately three paragraphs of the student’s exam answer. The student then superimposed some whimsical text about the upcoming exam completion deadline over the image, then publicly posted that picture on social media and privately forwarded it to at least one student enrolled in the class. When the student made the public posting (and forwarded the same image to a classmate) the exam period was still open and nearly half of the class had yet to turn in their exam. There is no evidence that the student did so with intent to benefit himself or others, nor is there any evidence that any student benefitted from the misdeed by altering or improving their own exam answer based on what they read in the student’s published partial answer.
As part of the settlement agreement, the student admitted that the student violated the Code. No formal sanctions were imposed on the student for the violation. One reason is that the student acted negligently rather than in bad faith and accepted responsibility for the conduct at issue. Another reason is that violation has collateral consequences that in effect amount to an appropriate sanction for the conduct. Those consequences include the need for the student to disclose the violation when the student applies for admission to the bar, the inclusion of the settlement agreement in the student’s permanent record, and the admissibility of the settlement agreement if any Honor Code proceedings are instituted against the student in the future.