The RRT to BSRT program classes are all online and asynchronous. Students are expected to participate in online discussions and submit assignments as designated in the course calendar.
Absences from Academic Activities
Planned absences from academic activities must be pre-approved by course instructor at least 4 weeks before the absence. Whenever possible, assignments should be completed before the planned absence.
Unplanned absences are defined as time away from academic activities that are not addressed prior to the content and/or assignments missed. If the student is absent and does not complete an exam or quiz while it is available, the exam should be taken within 24 hours of return if the absence is excused. Exams and quizzes missed for unexcused absences may not be made up.
The student is responsible for contacting the course instructor to discuss any absence. If the absence is excused, the student must communicate with each course faculty to plan make-up of missed assignments and/or exams. In case of an emergency, contact the course faculty as soon as possible.
All course assignments must be completed. If a student does not communicate with faculty and make arrangements for completion of assignments after an excused absence, faculty may deduct from the assignment or exam grade or give a grade of zero for the assignment or exam.
All assignments, quizzes, exams, etc. not completed due to unexcused absences will be assessed as zero (0).
Examples of excused absences:
Illness or injury documented by a licensed physician or subprovider (nurse practitioner or physician assistant) which renders the student unable to complete work via computer.
Death of an immediate family member such as spouse, child, parent, grandparent, or sibling (with documentation)
Court summons or jury duty (with documentation)
Military service (with documentation)
Examples of unexcused absences:
Domestic or international travel
Work commitments
Technical issues or access
Other issues not listed as “excused” above
Assignment Integrity
Along with the University policy on Academic Integrity, the RRT to BSRT program utilizes multiple tools to support students and faculty in academic honesty. These tools include:
Multifactor Authentication (MFA)
Authentication mechanism used in addition to the faculty and student’s username and password in order to verify their identity.
Added layer of security keeps their account and personal information safer and should be used whenever possible.
The program utilizes Honorlock, an online proctoring service, to proctor online assessments.
Students are required to show the proctor identification, surroundings, and other security concerns prior to beginning online assessments.
Student activity is monitored during online assessments by proctor to ensure assessment integrity.
Assessment review settings are controlled by faculty choice in assessment settings.
Students accessing proctored assessments on university devices are subject to lockdown browsers and additional proctoring.
Safe Assign
Safe Assign is a tool used to prevent plagiarism (including self-plagiarism) and to create opportunities to help students identify how to properly attribute sources rather than paraphrase.
Safe Assign compares submitted assignments against a set of sources to identify areas of overlap between the submitted assignment and existing works. After a student’s paper is submitted, The Safe Assign report will be generated, and a score provided to the student.
Overall score is an indicator of what percentage of the submitted paper matches existing sources. This score is a warning indicator only and papers should be reviewed to see if the matches are properly attributed.
Scores below 15 percent: These papers typical include some quotes and few common phrases or blocks of text that match other documents. These papers typically do not require further analysis, as there is no evidence of the possibility of plagiarism in these papers.
Scores between 15 percent and 30 percent: These papers include extensive quoted or paraphrased material or they may include plagiarism. These papers should be reviewed to determine if the matching content is properly attributed.
Scores over 30 percent: There is a very high probability that text in this paper was copied from other sources. These papers include quoted or paraphrased text in excess and should be reviewed for plagiarism.
Artificial Intelligence (AI)
AI is forbidden unless specifically instructed for use or authorized with the instructor’s prior permission or direction.
Artificial intelligence (AI) tools that generate text, images, code, and other content are widely available. If you submit work containing any content generated by AI when not explicitly allowed and not in a way directed by the instructor, then this will be considered academic dishonesty and a violation of USI’s academic integrity policy. If you are not sure about what may be academic dishonesty or plagiarism and what is acceptable use in this course and on specific assignments, please contact your instructor to discuss.
You are not permitted to use AI tools that generate content (such as ChatGPT, CoPilot, Grok, Gemini, Bard, DALL-E) for work done in this program. Writing, analytical, and critical thinking skills are part of your learning outcomes in this program; therefore, all writing assignments should be prepared by you, the student. Content created by AI tools will not be considered your own original work. This program assumes that work submitted by students (all process work, drafts, final versions, and all other submissions) will be generated by the students themselves, working individually or in groups (as directed).
Students are advised via syllabus policy and verbal discussion that all assessments are subject to academic integrity policies for the Program, College, and University.
USI seeks to protect the integrity of what transpires during class sessions among students and instructor, any course materials prepared by the instructor, and the privacy of students and faculty. Please refer to the syllabus for any course-specific policies from the instructor.
Course Materials Sharing
Your instructor is the owner of copyright in course materials that your instructor creates. You are encouraged to take notes and make copies of course materials for your own educational use. However, you may not, nor may you knowingly allow others to reproduce or distribute lecture notes and course materials publicly without my express written consent. This includes providing materials to commercial course material suppliers such as Course Hero, Chegg, and other similar services. Students who publicly distribute or display or help others publicly distribute or display copies or modified copies of an instructor's course materials may be in violation of The Student Rights and Responsibilities: Code of Student Behavior. Similarly, you own copyright in your original papers and exam essays. If your instructor is interested in posting your answers or papers on the course web site, your written permission will be requested.
Recording Class Sessions
You are not permitted to record (audio or video) of any class activity, except in cases when the student has an approved accommodation from Disability Resources permitting the recording of class sessions for the student’s personal educational purposes. In such cases, the accommodation letter must be presented to the instructor in advance of any recording being done, and all students in the course will be notified whenever recording will be taking place. You may not copy, publish, post, or redistribute audio or video recordings with anyone not in this class. Doing so would be a breach of the Code of Student Behavior, and, in some cases, a violation of the Federal Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and copyright laws.
The Respiratory Therapy Programs will abide by the 7th Edition of the APA Manual for written assignments. Faculty will provide guidelines regarding minimal expectations for adherence to APA style. Additional guidance for writing in APA style may be found at the Rice Library website.
