Honor Council Proposes Honor Code Revisions

Ashley Imdieke, Managing Editor • April 30, 2025

Photo Courtesy of Luther College.

This spring, the Luther College Honor Council is proposing a set of changes to the Honor Code. On May 15, the Student Senate will approve or deny any revisions of the Honor Code by a 2/3rds majority vote. View the edits made to the existing Honor Code document here, and the clean copy of the proposed version here.

Below is a statement from the Honor Council outlining the proposed changes and their rationales. Contact [email protected] with any questions or suggestions.

Honor Council Revision Statement

Did you know that students have a voice in Honor Code revisions and reaffirmations? The Honor Council is requesting approval for some updates to the Honor Code and this statement outlines the key changes. While a few updates have been made, the processes for reviewing suspected Honor Code violations remain largely unchanged. Most of the revisions focus on restructuring the Honor Council to help preserve institutional knowledge from year to year. Both the revised Honor Code and a version showing changes are available on CHIPS for the next two weeks, leading up to a Student Senate vote on whether to adopt the revisions.

The Honor Code is the document that all Luther students agree to uphold in their coursework that sets the framework for academic integrity and responsibility. An important part of the Honor Code is that it establishes that students hold each other accountable for academic integrity. For this reason, the Honor Council is made up of students and the Student Senate must approve or deny any revisions of the Honor Code by 2/3rds majority vote.

One of the biggest changes made was the restructure of the Honor Council to remove the Honor Council Educational Committee and the Honor Council Review Board (see sections 2, 3, and 5). The restructuring moves the responsibilities of the Educational Committee and of the Honor Council Review Board to the Honor Council as a whole. This is a practical change, as the Honor Council has not had an Educational Committee for at least the last two years. The change is meant to increase the institutional memory of the Honor Council by having a larger pool of students reviewing cases regularly, as well as to help keep enough members to satisfy quorum requirements, which has been a problem in the past.

There have been edits making language more inclusive and clear (e.g. spelling out abbreviations, and replacing ‘he/she’ with ‘they’). There also were edits to change outdated College Offices (ex. The Dean of the College does not exist anymore).

This revision of the Honor Code keeps the content of the Preamble, Terms and Definitions, Procedures of the Honor Code, Sanctions, Appeals Process, Review, Amendment, Revisions, and Appendix 1 of the Honor Council largely untouched. The minor changes that were made to these sections include removing outdated methods of communication for the release of decisions and notices of cases (see 4.3.2, 4.12.2.1, and 4.13). It also includes two additions that specifically spell out ways in which the use of AI may be violate the Honor Code (see 1.3.4.1 and Appendix I – Plagiarism)

The Honor Council has spent considerable time discussing changes, striving to keep the Honor Code in line with the spirit of the document while removing out-of-date practices. In this revision of the Honor Code, we have carefully considered the consequences of all of the changes and firmly believe that these changes to the Honor Code are a necessary and positive step for the Luther College community. The Honor Code and the fair and just interpretation of the Honor Code is a crucial part of a Luther education, one that will stick with students as they venture into the world.

This semester, the Honor Council has seen a rise in the number of cases that use Artificial Intelligence in a way that hinders learning. We would like to make it clear that there are ways to use Artificial Intelligence that are appropriate. For this statement, ChatGPT was used to edit for clarity and flow.

Sincerely,

Allan Mills, Honor Council Chair

Makenzie Dahlstrom, Honor Council Vice Chair

Noelle Hendricks

Nora Tresemer

Mark Severtson

Kai Stemm

Dr. Susan Schmidt, Honor Council Faculty Advisor

Clean Copy of Proposed Honor Code: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1DupROj9gVza6VFnd4In-P5VOEsnt4cPF/edit?tab=t.0

Existing Honor Code with Proposed Edits: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1CFfFX9ulfQBA2GZGEyps7V54RvWMwsJy/edit?tab=t.0