Date posted: 4y

Hey everyone, I don’t know if I’m asking for reassurance, but I need some guidance. Query: Academic integrity I’m nearing exam period (I’m currently in study break) and my obsessions around academic integrity and honesty are rising again. Our class was given the instruction sheet for exams early and it said that you aren’t allowed to exchange written summaries of the permissible materials for the exam with each other (the exams are all open book, but permissible materials are lectures, tutorials and readings). My mid year exam period was really hard on me. I was struggling to keep up cause my OCD relapsed and I was struggling to take care of it, and then my uncle passed away unexpectedly, so I got pretty behind with studies but I still managed to keep up with all of the content and write up my cheat sheet (this is permissible, it’s just a condensed version of your notes as it’s too time consuming to go over all your notes). Despite my circumstances, I wouldn’t help feeling bad for my peers who were struggling to keep up. They weren’t behind because of any other circumstances, mainly just because our studies has such a huge workload (studying law is basically a full time job). I felt an obligation to send my cheat sheets to them (we didn’t communicate on these documents, so I always assumed this wasn’t cheating considering how many other students admitted to doing it as well). Sometimes I would insist I’d give it to them because I felt bad that I couldn’t really see them suffer, but sometimes they’d ask for other notes from me. This became exhausting for me because a lot of people ended up depending on me. One of them reciprocated and gave one cheat sheet to me, to which I drew some of their notes and incorporated mine, as well as some from the student note bank which is backed by the university law student organisation (permissible to use the latter). When exams came along, I failed two out of three exams. I was really disappointed, but my peers ended up passing (but they were also disappointed with their grades). I really do not want to commit academic dishonesty again, there have been so many instances where I didn’t realise I actually was technically cheating because I would discuss ideas with my peers for assignments. But recently, my friend came to me and asked me to send her all my tutorial notes because she was behind this semester. I previously gave her my case sheet and lecture notes (the latter because her laptop died on her and she lost everything, she was also the one that still gave me a cheat sheet which I’m thankful for). I’m not going to lie, but I didn’t feel like giving it to her because I’m not being compassionate to myself when I am struggling myself, but I didn’t know how to respond to it so I said “sure, just make sure to go to the office hours and run through those notes cause they’re vague”. So I sent them to her, but I really regret it once I saw the instruction sheet for the exam, literally saying that it went against the university policies. The exam hasn’t started yet but I’m just ruminating. Sorry for the rant, but I want to know how to approach this situation??? I won’t get caught for this because it’s just tutorial notes which is hard to track but it’s sick and tiring when I give people my notes and I fail and they pass and I don’t want to be dishonest :(

ARTnotOCD

Date posted: 4y

Academic integrity is something onto which my OCD also loves to latch. I wish I had some good pointers for you, but I think I just eventually would hand things in or take exams and then my mom and I would say something like, “It’s up to the puppies and their magic now.” It wasn’t magical thinking, it was just a way we liked to accept that nothing more could be done. It was a way to help deal with the uncertainty as well as make me smile to think about puppies. I’m sending you strength and comfort and all the puppies in the world and I wish you the best. 💪🏼💜

Date posted: 4y

Thank you for your advice! That’s a really good mindset to have. In one of the exams I failed (I got to take another test for exceptional circumstances), we were assigned a question that we had gone over in class, word for word, which I had the answer for. I started freaking out if I was plagiarising so I tried to make up my own answer. And then when it came to submission time, I still had heaps to write, and my eyes were just stuck on the Turnitin page that was talking about plagiarism and I was so frozen. I don’t know how to do mindfulness for this but that is a really good tip.

ARTnotOCD

Date posted: 4y

@s Have you registered with the appropriate school department that you have a disability? I’m my school, it was the Office of Specialized Services, but whatever they call it at your school, it helps with reasonable accommodations, and acts as a liaison between you and your professors to keep your personal information private while helping you level the playing field. (I used to struggle that it was unfair for me to have help, and my mom reminded me that it’s unfair for me to have ADD & OCD and these accommodations just make things a little closer to fair.). They won’t necessarily help the OCD directly, but they totally helped me finally graduate. Maybe they can separate the exam pages from the plagiarism page for you. Not because you want avoidance, but because an exam period isn’t the time to have extra things to face. A lot of times they can also give you a little extended time on tests. Again, there were plenty times I still didn’t finish with that extra time, but I had a better chance to actually be tested on my abilities instead of my disabilities. You are so not alone, and I’m rooting for you!

Date posted: 4y

@ARTnotOCD Yes I’m registered with my university’s disability services. I’m not sure about the extended time on tests, as I’ve been told before that can be bad for someone with Pure-O as they might spend that extra time ruminating. But I might go over this with my disability advisor and therapist. Thank you for the tips!

Thinking_Addict

Date posted: 4y

It seems that you are uncertain about whether you are committing academic dishonesty. Instead of trying to solve the uncertainty, try to accept it. You might even consider writing a script of the worse case scenario with the supervision of your therapist.

Date posted: 4y

I’ve been trying to accept it, but I feel like I just beat myself up a lot

Date posted: 4y

thank you though! i will try and discuss this more with my therapist

Date posted: 4y

hey @ARTnotOCD - i talked with my disability advisor and they understood my situation, recommending me to have extra time for my exams (10 minutes per hour, which is a lot!!) thank you for your help!!

ARTnotOCD

Date posted: 4y

Proud of you for contacting them and speaking up for your needs! So glad to hear about the accommodations! 🙂💜

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