Integrity Policy | 2026-27 Academic Catalog

Students are expected to perform with academic and personal integrity in all aspects of the graduate program. Academic dishonesty includes practices such as: plagiarism; the unauthorized use of study aids during examinations; stealing, borrowing, or purchasing another person's work; using the same paper twice for two different courses, etc. Meridian has adopted the definition of plagiarism offered in Kate Turabian's A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses and Dissertations, 7th ed.: "By definition, a research paper involves the assimilation of prior scholarship and entails the responsibility to give proper acknowledgment whenever one is indebted to another for either words or ideas. . . [students must acknowledge] the words and ideas of others in a paper by quoting works accurately and attributing quotations and ideas to their authors in notes. Failure to give credit is plagiarism." All student papers are subject to plagiarism software scans. When students are found to have behaved in an academically dishonest manner or to have plagiarized, the issue will be brought to the attention of the Director of Assessment and Student Development (DASD), who will then bring it to the Student Development Committee. The Student Development Committee is authorized to take appropriate disciplinary action, ranging from requiring the student to repeat the assignment or course; requiring the student to do additional work; placing the student on Academic Probation; requiring the student to take tutorial(s); and/or to initiate administrative withdrawal from Meridian. (See Administrative Withdrawal section). At times, students may find themselves in the uncomfortable position of having knowledge of another student's academic dishonesty. In such cases, it is the student's ethical responsibility to take steps towards the resolution of the issue. Ethical steps would involve supporting the student who acted dishonestly to disclose their actions, and if this is unsuccessful, to report the issue to the DASD, who will conduct an inquiry.