University of Virginia Library

Student Complaint

Historically the University
Honor System began in 1842 when
Professor Henry St. George Tucker
responded to the student complaint
that the close faculty surveillance
of examinations implied distrust by
proposing a resolution to the
faculty which read: "In all future
written examinations for
distinctions and other honors in the
University of Virginia, each
candidate shall attach to the
written answers presented by him
in such examinations a certificate in
the following words: 'I, A.B., do
hereby certify on honor that I have
derived no assistance during the
time of the examination from any
source whatever, whether oral,
written, or in print, in giving the
above answers." The faculty
adopted the resolution and later
extended it to include the giving as
well as the receiving of aid.

This examination policy
inaugurated a new age in the
student-faculty relationships at the
University. In 1851 the
enforcement of the Honor System
passed into the hands of the
students. Thereafter it was they
who determined what students
could not return to the University,
thereby eliminating the right of
appeal to the faculty. Yet
throughout the nineteenth century
the students established no
formalized system of enforcement.
Not until 1909 did the University
establish a Honor System with
formal rules and procedures and a
permanent Honor Committee.
Students can study in detail the
machinery and procedures of the
Honor System as it functions today
by referring to the printed "Blue
Sheet."