Academic Integrity Policy and Instruction in K-12 schools in Australia, Canada, England and the United States

Abstract

This study was formulated to explore the current status of academic integrity policy and instruction in K-12 schools, particularly in developed English-speaking countries. The data reveals that in participating countries, 45.7% of public schools and 40.6% of private schools offer academic integrity education at the primary level. Participating SLPs indicated there are a number of reasons for this, including - a lack of support from school principals or from program coordinators; teachers put little emphasis on information literacy and AIL skills integration into core subjects; there is no clear policy on AIL instruction; and, SLPs do not have a dedicated lesson or no school/district-wide AIL scope and sequence documents to teach academic integrity, or have limited opportunity/time to collaborate.