A Roadmap Towards Integrity: A President's Perspective Twenty Years On

In this session, I will share what prompted my original 2002-2003 study on student academic misconduct with Don McCabe, published in the Canadian Journal of Higher Education, and my reflections on what has transpired in the ensuing twenty years. Highlighting key observations from my more recent contributions (in Handbook of Academic Integrity and Academic Integrity in Canada: An Enduring and Essential Challenge), I will present a roadmap towards integrity, with implications for senior university administrators (as well as faculty and students), committed to strengthening the integrity of the academy

Academic Integrity in Canada: An Enduring and Essential Challenge

In this session, Dr. Julia Christensen Hughes and Dr. Sarah Elaine Eaton will reflect on academic integrity in Canada, synthesize their various contributions, and challenge future practice. Drawing from their book, Academic Integrity in Canada: An Enduring and Essential challenge, they will highlight their experience and insights, since the seminal work of Christensen Hughes and McCabe (2006), focusing on the enduring and essential challenge of building cultures and practices aligned with academic integrity in Canadian higher education today. Participants will gain insight into current challenges and strategies for supporting academic integrity in their own administrative and teaching and research practice

Mode analysis of numerical geodynamo models

It has been suggested in Hoyng (2009) that dynamo action can be analysed by expansion of the magnetic field into dynamo modes and statistical evaluation of the mode coefficients. We here validate this method by analysing a numerical geodynamo model and comparing the numerically derived mean mode coefficients with the theoretical predictions. The model belongs to the class of kinematically stable dynamos with a dominating axisymmetric, antisymmetric with respect to the equator and non-periodic fundamental dynamo mode. The analysis requires a number of steps: the computation of the so-called dynamo coefficients, the derivation of the temporally and azimuthally averaged dynamo eigenmodes and the decomposition of the magnetic field of the numerical geodynamo model into the eigenmodes. For the determination of the theoretical mode excitation levels the turbulent velocity field needs to be projected on the dynamo eigenmodes. We compare the theoretically and numerically derived mean mode coefficients and find reasonably good agreement for most of the modes. Some deviation might be attributable to the approximation involved in the theory. Since the dynamo eigenmodes are not self-adjoint a spectral interpretation of the eigenmodes is not possible

Academic Misconduct within Higher Education in Canada

Despite a plethora of research on the academic misconduct carried out by U.S. high school and undergraduate university students, little research has been done on the academic misconduct of Canadian students. This paper addresses this shortcoming by presenting the results of a study conducted at 11 Canadian higher education institutions between January 2002 and March 2003. We maintain that academic misconduct does indeed occur in Canada – amongst high school, undergraduate and graduate students. Common self-reported behaviours were as follows: working on an assignment with others when asked for individual work, getting questions and answers from someone who has already taken a test, copying a few sentences of material without footnoting, fabricating or falsifying lab data, and receiving unauthorized help on an assignment. Possible factors associated with these behaviours include student maturity, perceptions of what constitutes academic misconduct, faculty assessment and invigilation practices, low perceived risk, ineffective and poorly understood policies and procedures, and a lack of education on academic misconduct. Canadian educational institutions are encouraged to address these issues, beginning with a recommitment to academic integrity.Malgré l’abondance de recherches sur la probité intellectuelle parmi les étudiantes et les étudiants de l’enseignement secondaire et universitaire aux États-Unis, peu de recherches ont été effectuées sur ce sujet au Canada. Cet article vise à combler cette lacune en présentant les résultats d’une étude entreprise dans 11 établissements d’enseignement supérieur au Canada entre janvier 2002 et mars 2003. Selon les résultats de l’étude, des manques à la probité intellectuelle se produisent en effet au Canada, tant dans l’enseignement secondaire qu’au premier cycle et aux cycles supérieurs des universités. Les comportements les plus fréquemment rapportés par les répondants sont: travailler avec d’autres sur une tâche individuelle; obtenir des questions et réponses de personnes qui ont déjà passé un examen; plagier; fabriquer ou falsifi er des données de laboratoire; et recevoir une aide interdite dans l’accomplissement d’une tâche. Ces comportements peuvent être associés à divers facteurs: la maturité de l’étudiante ou de l’étudiant; la perception de la gravité du comportement en question; les pratiques d’évaluation et de surveillance du corps enseignant ; la perception du niveau de risque; la clarté et l’effi cacité des procédures établies; et à un manque d’éducation sur les questions de conduite universitaire. Les établissements d’enseignement canadiens sont encouragés à tenter de résoudre ces problèmes, en commençant par renouveler leur engagement envers la probité intellectuelle

Understanding Academic Misconduct

Research suggests that the majority of U.S. undergraduate students have engaged in some form of misconduct while completing their academic work, despite knowing that such behaviour is ethically or morally wrong. U.S.-based studies have also identified myriad personal and institutional factors associated with academic misconduct. Implicit in some of these factors are several institutional strategies that may be implemented to support academic integrity: revisiting the values and goals of higher education, recommitting to quality in teaching and assessment practice, establishing effective policies and invigilation practices, providing educational opportunities and support for all members of the university community, and using (modified) academic honour codes. There is a dearth of similar research in Canada despite growing recognition that academic misconduct is a problem on Canadian campuses. This paper suggests that Canadian higher education can learn much from the U.S. experience and calls for both a recommitment to academic integrity and research on academic misconduct in Canadian higher education institutions.La littérature suggère que la majorité des étudiants de premier cycle aux États-Unis ont pratiqué au moins une forme de malhonnêteté académique dans la préparation de leur travail universitaire, et ce bien qu’ils sachent qu’un tel comportement contrevient à l’éthique et à la morale. Les recherches américaines ont également identifi é de nombreux facteurs personnels et institutionnels associés aux conduites inappropriées. Ces facteurs sont implicitement reliés à plusieurs stratégies institutionnelles qui peuvent être appliquées pour soutenir la probité intellectuelle: mettre à jour les valeurs et les buts de l’enseignement supérieur, renouveler l’engagement envers la qualité de l’enseignement et de l’évaluation, établir des politiques et des pratiques de surveillance efficaces, offrir un soutien à tous les membres de la communauté universitaire et utiliser des codes d’honneur universitaire modifiés. Au Canada, malgré l’identification de problèmes de probité intellectuelle sur les campus, il y a pénurie de recherche sur ce sujet. Cet article suggère que l’enseignement supérieur canadien a beaucoup à apprendre de l’expérience américaine et lance un appel favorable tant à un renouveau de l’engagement envers la probité intellectuelle qu’à un accroissement de la recherche sur ce sujet dans les institutions canadiennes d’enseignement supérieu

The effect of the tachocline on differential rotation in the Sun

In this paper, we present a model for the effects of the tachocline on the differential rotation in the solar convection zone. The mathematical technique relies on the assumption that entropy is nearly constant ("well-mixed") in isorotation surfaces both outside and within the tachocline. The resulting solutions exhibit nontrivial features that strikingly resemble the true tachocline isorotation contours in unexpected detail. This strengthens the mathematical premises of the theory. The observed rotation pattern in the tachocline shows strong quadrupolar structure, an important feature that is explicitly used in constructing our solutions. The tachocline is treated locally as an interior boundary layer of small but finite thickness, and an explicit global solution is then constructed. A dynamical link can thus be established between the internal jump in the angular velocity at the tachocline and the spread of angular velocities observed near the solar surface. In general, our results suggest that the bulk of the solar convection zone is in thermal wind balance, and that simple quadrupolar stresses, local in radius, mediate the tachocline transition from differential rotation to uniform rotation in the radiative interior.Comment: 20 Pages, 4 figures, to appear in MNRA

Prospects for the Detection of the Deep Solar Meridional Circulation

We perform helioseismic holography to assess the noise in p-mode travel-time shifts which would form the basis of inferences of large-scale flows throughout the solar convection zone. We also derive the expected travel times from a parameterized return (equatorward) flow component of the meridional circulation at the base of the convection zone from forward models under the assumption of the ray and Born approximations. From estimates of the signal-to-noise ratio for measurements focused near the base of the convection zone, we conclude that the helioseismic detection of the deep meridional flow including the return component may not be possible using data spanning an interval less than a solar cycle

Interactions between magnetohydrodynamic shear instabilities and convective flows in the solar interior

Motivated by the interface model for the solar dynamo, this paper explores the complex magnetohydrodynamic interactions between convective flows and shear-driven instabilities. Initially, we consider the dynamics of a forced shear flow across a convectively-stable polytropic layer, in the presence of a vertical magnetic field. When the imposed magnetic field is weak, the dynamics are dominated by a shear flow (Kelvin-Helmholtz type) instability. For stronger fields, a magnetic buoyancy instability is preferred. If this stably stratified shear layer lies below a convectively unstable region, these two regions can interact. Once again, when the imposed field is very weak, the dynamical effects of the magnetic field are negligible and the interactions between the shear layer and the convective layer are relatively minor. However, if the magnetic field is strong enough to favour magnetic buoyancy instabilities in the shear layer, extended magnetic flux concentrations form and rise into the convective layer. These magnetic structures have a highly disruptive effect upon the convective motions in the upper layer.Comment: 11 pages, 10 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA