How to avoid cheating in exams - do's and don'ts

Here you will find examples from everyday student life where you may, perhaps unintentionally, come into conflict with DTU's rules on cheating - and what you can do to avoid problems.

Situation Do's  Don'ts

Before the exam, you have made joint notes/formula collections with some fellow students. To the exam with all aids allowed or in connection with a written submission, you insert results from the joint notes in your answer.

If you are copying from the common notes, be sure to include them among your sources and quote correctly if practical possible. Without proper references to the notes, it is not possible to identify your individual performance. A written, individual exam/submission requires - with its individuality requirements - a visible personal effort.

 You copy from the common notes without quoting and without citation.
A friend, enrolled in the same course as you, contacts you just before deadline, asking to see your exam submission in the course. You answer: “I cannot show you my exam submission, but we can meet and I can explain how I tackled the assignment." You answer: “OK, I’ll email my exam submission to you."

You have to sit a written exam without aids.

 You will follow the rules and only take the dictionaries that are allowed with you. You will take notes with you into the exam - whether they are on paper or written on your hand.

You have to submit a report on a topic you have previously written about.

You ask the lecturer whether it can be reused. If not, you refrain from doing so. If so, you ensure you do it correctly, using quotations and references. You reuse text from the old report without referencing or quoting it, thinking “after all, I wrote them both”.

You have to submit a report based on a set topic formulation.

 Given that a topic formulation is a source like all others, you make sure to quote it correctly and include it among your sources. You reformulate the topic formulation without quoting or referencing it.

You are having trouble finding data for your report/MSc thesis.

 You will talk to your supervisor or your lecturer and together you will find a solution to the problem. You invent your own data to satisfy the problem formulation.

You are having difficulty writing a take-home assignment which is due soon.

 You tell your lecturer about the problem and ask for help. If the problem is more general—the whole course is difficult—you can also seek help and advice from the Student Guidance Office.

You borrow a previously assessed assignment from a friend and change it before you hand it in.

You get a friend or a family member to write it for you.

You pay someone else to write the report.

You have to submit a report in which you have made use of many different sources.

 All sources—including textbooks and other students’ reports—are quoted and referenced. You know the lecturer has used the material in his teaching, so you assume that he can easily distinguish between your work and theirs.

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