<p>Supreme Court justices don’t write their own opinions.</p>
<p>I guess it depends on experience and the field of the faculty members. I did not know until I started witnessing it first-hand. My local colleagues (in science) who have no administrative experience still imagine that the documents are written by the people who are the apparent authors and/or signatories. Probably people in the social sciences, business, and history are more aware of the reality.</p>
<p>It strikes me as a non-issue. The ability to phrase certain things in a certain way is a talent, and that talent gets outsourced to PR firms. Anyone who’s worked in the business / corporate world in any capacity certainly wouldn’t be surprised, unless they are incredibly naive. </p>
<p>Having said that, who on earth bothers to go into the “Document Properties”? If people re-use drafts of things, who knows who is viewed as the original author?</p>
<p>I would also add to the above that I bet a couple of University lawyers took a look at the many statements coming out of UVA just about now and have added/changed a few paragraphs of their own, along with the PR firm.
Its a non-issue with the honor code.</p>