Academic dishonesty out, use of resources in

Abstract

The outbreak of COVID-19 necessitated the call for integrating teaching and assessment into virtual environments. To explore the types of resources students accessed during online exams, engineering students were administered an unproctored online English for Academic Purposes (EAP) mid-term exam. Subsequently, a questionnaire was administered to investigate students’ use of resources while taking the exam. The results of an exploratory factor analysis was used to categorize students’ use of resources, external to one's self, shedding light on student perception of the act. The analysis revealed that 60 % of the common variance could be attributed to access to both human and nonhuman resources external to oneself. The transition from face to face teaching and assessment to online education has led to an increase in the utilization of resources external to one's self. Traditionally this act has been termed academic dishonesty. The study argues that this should not be viewed as a disruption, but rather a symptom of the transition embraced by online education with recourse to high accessibility to online and offline resources. Despite the general notion that of the use of resources external to one's self is discouraged, students exhibited a prevalent tendency to use resources external to themselves on the online exam. Of significance is the call for a redefinition of what constitutes academic misbehavior or dishonesty in a world that is digitally connected 24/7.