Where Ideas Grow

i3S is advocating INTEGRITY

The European Commission has just financed the INTEGRITY project with €2.4 million for three years through the Horizon2020 program. It is a consortium with 11 European partners including i3S and it aims to develop strategies and tools for teaching integrity in Science.

 

Led by the University of Utrecht, the consortium involves 11 partners from nine European countries and aims to respond to current research needs and requirements with regard to Responsible Conduct of Research, based on three core values: Transparency, Honesty, and Accountability.

 

The strategy of the INTEGRITY team is to create knowledge and produce tools to support high school and university teachers, who are often asked to teach professional ethics and integrity. According to Anna Olsson, Portuguese leader of the project, "all members of this multidisciplinary team that will develop the project have faced the challenge of teaching integrity without support materials and with very limited resources and are therefore fully aware of the difficulties European teachers face".

 

Based on the experience and knowledge acquired over the years, this team will build tools that can be used by all European teachers, thus avoiding the need to create their work plan. The diversity of proposals is extensive: from teaching modules on good practice, MOOCs (Massive Open Online Course), to interactive films.

 

The i3S researcher also explains that "there is a pressing need on the part of students in various fields of science and in many countries to learn to cope with the challenges of a very competitive academic and scientific environment". Therefore, the "ultimate goal is for future researchers to acquire these practices and knowledge during their training in secondary and higher education".

 

Academic integrity, Anna Olsson states, "is not just about the big scandals or about dishonesty and malice, it's about the challenges all academics encounter throughout their careers". Responsibly addressing integrity issues within institutions means raising awareness, discussing issues, and developing a shared understanding of what constitutes good practices.