| Matter of Katz v Board of Regents of the Univ. of the State ofN.Y. |
| 2011 NY Slip Op 04581 [85 AD3d 1277] |
| June 2, 2011 |
| Appellate Division, Third Department |
| In the Matter of Jonathan Katz, Appellant, v Board of Regents ofthe University of the State of New York et al., Respondents. |
—[*1] Eric T. Schneiderman, Attorney General, Albany (Zainab A. Chaudhry of counsel), forrespondents.
Kavanagh, J. Appeal from a judgment of the Supreme Court (Platkin, J.), entered April 7,2010 in Albany County, which dismissed petitioner's application, in a proceeding pursuant toCPLR article 78, to review a determination of respondent Dean of Harpur College of Arts andSciences finding petitioner guilty of plagiarism.
Petitioner attended respondent Harpur College of Arts and Sciences (hereinafter the College)at respondent Binghamton University in the fall of 2008, and was enrolled in a history course,which required that he prepare a term paper that focused on a major historical event that occurredin Europe between 1900 and 1945. After petitioner submitted a polished draft of a paper entitled"Russian Intentions in Signing the Non Aggression Pact with Germany," his professor voicedconcerns about the integrity of the document and, in particular, expressed skepticism aboutpetitioner's claim that he did not use any secondary sources in his preparation of the paper. Afterthe professor met with petitioner and discussed with him how he had composed the paper, sheconcluded that parts of it were not his own work and that he was guilty of plagiarism. She toldpetitioner that if he accepted a failing grade for the paper and admitted to plagiarism, she wouldnot refer the matter to the College's Academic Honesty Committee (hereinafter the Committee).When petitioner refused this offer,[FN1]the professor submitted a report to the Committee detailing her reasons for believing thatpetitioner was guilty of plagiarism and asked that it conduct a formal review of the matter. TheCommittee notified petitioner of the charges in writing and informed him that a hearing would beheld at which he had the right to have someone present to advise and assist him. After hearingfrom both petitioner and the professor, the Committee unanimously concluded that petitioner wasguilty of plagiarism and filed a recommendation with the Associate Dean of Academic Affairsthat petitioner be suspended from the College for one semester.[FN2]The Associate Dean reviewed the Committee's report, as well as other materials submitted at thehearing, and concurred with the finding that petitioner was guilty of plagiarism. In her decision,the Associate Dean found that the "blatant nature" of the plagiarism required that petitioner'spenalty be altered to a six-month delay in the certification of his college degree.
Petitioner filed an appeal with respondent Dean of Harpur College of Arts and Sciences.During his review of these proceedings, the Dean obtained an independent assessment ofpetitioner's paper from an expert in the field who concluded, after reviewing the document, that"[c]learly, some of the more felicitous phrases in this paper were lifted from a secondary source,"and stated "[i]f [petitioner] is a plagiarist (which I suspect he probably is), he's really not verygood at it."[FN3]The Dean confirmed the finding of plagiarism noting that, while College authorities were unable"to identify additional sources from you which you took material used in your paper, thepreponderance of the evidence indicates that other parts of the paper are not your own work," butmodified petitioner's penalty to a failing grade in the course. Subsequently, petitionercommenced this CPLR article 78 proceeding challenging the determination that he was guilty ofplagiarism. When Supreme Court dismissed his petition, this appeal ensued.
A university's disciplinary determination will be upheld and not be deemed arbitrary andcapricious if it is based on a rational interpretation of the relevant evidence and the "universitysubstantially adhered to its own published rules and guidelines" in arriving at the decision (Matter of Hyman v Cornell Univ., 82AD3d 1309, 1310 [2011] [internal quotation marks and citations omitted]; see Matter of Warner v Elmira Coll.,59 AD3d 909, 910 [2009]; Matter of Basile v Albany Coll. of Pharm. of UnionUniv., 279 AD2d 770, 771 [2001], lv denied 96 NY2d 708 [2001]). Here, petitionerdoes not deny that he was provided with notice of the charges and given a hearing during whichhe was able to present evidence, examine witnesses and make arguments contesting theallegation that portions of his paper had been plagiarized from other sources (see Matter ofNawaz v State Univ. of N.Y. Univ. at Buffalo School of Dental Medicine, [*2]295 AD2d 944, 945 [2002]). However, he claims that the Collegedid not comply with its own rules and regulations and denied him due process because he wasnever "confronted with the source from which he was charged with plagiarizing."
Initially, we note that the College's Student Academic Honesty Code (hereinafter the Code)does not define plagiarism to require that the source of the plagiarism be specifically identified.While the faculty handbook suggests that any plagiarism charge be accompanied by "acomparison of the source document with the plagiarized document," such a submission is notmandated by the College's rules and regulations and, while preferable, is not, in our view, anessential prerequisite for a plagiarism finding to be rationally based. In that regard, the Codecharacterizes plagiarism as a form of academic dishonesty involving the "misappropriation ofacademic or intellectual credit to oneself" and is committed when one presents the "work ofanother person as one's own." Conduct it classifies as plagiarism includes: the "quoting,paraphrasing or summarizing without acknowledgment, even a few phrases"; "failing toacknowledge the source of either a major idea or ordering a principle central to one's own paper";"relying on another person's data, evidence or critical method without credit or permission";"submitting another person's work as one's own"; or "using unacknowledged resource sourcesgathered by someone else." A finding that plagiarism has been committed using such adescription can be based entirely on the content of the work and the circumstances under whichthe work has been prepared.
Here, compelling circumstantial evidence exists, based on the paper's content and the timingof its preparation, that provided a rational basis for the conclusion reached by the Committee andaffirmed during the administrative process that petitioner used secondary sources in the paper,which he failed to identify. In that regard, petitioner, according to his professor, was totally"unprepared" to discuss the paper, and had not even settled on a topic less than three weeksbefore it was due. Moreover, the draft in question was submitted by petitioner only 10 days afterhe had selected a topic and had begun the laborious process of analyzing the historical data uponwhich the paper would be based. As noted by the Dean in his decision confirming the finding ofplagiarism, it was "highly unlikely that [petitioner] could have read and analyzed the documentscontained in the two collections cited in [petitioner's] paper, digested them, and integrated theminto a paper that included polished passages in such a short time. It would be a difficult task for aseasoned history graduate student to accomplish, and it is highly improbable that [petitioner]accomplished this on [his] own." In addition, the draft did not include a bibliography, made noreference to any secondary sources, and failed to contain proper page numbers for its citationsand, yet, it set forth a detailed analysis of primary sources generated by these historical eventsthat petitioner claimed as his own. Also, the professor, in addition to questioning the unevenquality of the vocabulary and syntax in the draft, noted that "the level of research [petitioner]ostensibly conducted in complicated and copious primary documents is implausible in thisamount of time. It is my professional opinion that he could not have . . . read,assimilated, and placed in a semi-coherent account this vast body of documents in this shortamount of time; moreover, this work could not have been accomplished without the use ofsecondary sources. His ability to link a very disparate body of documents, when he does sosuccessfully, suggests the analytical ability of a professional historian."
The belief that petitioner was guilty of plagiarism was reinforced by his apparent inability tointelligently discuss many of the issues generated by these historical events, even though he hadjust completed the paper and finished his research. In addition, at the hearing, as noted bymembers of the Committee, petitioner was not able "to define key terms/concepts he [*3]used in his draft." Moreover, petitioner's own expert, afterexamining the paper, stated that she could "appreciate how a suspicion of plagiarism could arise"and made pointed reference, as did other educators who examined this draft, to petitioner's abilityto arrive at conclusions in the paper regarding "causality with no explicit scholarly support."
Based on our review of this record, we conclude that petitioner was provided with dueprocess and the determination by respondents that he had in fact plagiarized this paper wassupported by a rational basis (see Matter of Rensselaer Socy. of Engrs. v RensselaerPolytechnic Inst., 260 AD2d 992, 993 [1999]). As a result, the judgment dismissing thispetition should be, in all respects, affirmed.
Mercure, J.P., Spain, Stein and Garry, JJ., concur. Ordered that the judgment is affirmed,without costs.
Footnote 1: According to the professor,petitioner ultimately offered to take a failing grade for the paper if she would not initiateplagiarism proceedings.
Footnote 2: The Committee was composedof an Assistant Dean as chairperson, three faculty members and two members of the studentbody.
Footnote 3: Petitioner, in Supreme Court,waived any claim that his due process rights were violated by the Dean's consideration of anexpert opinion that was not before the Committee when it rendered its determination.