Proctored exams are as smooth as having proctologist to look remotely through your webcam
Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
11–20 of 242 posts
Re: Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
#12Makes me glad for things like the Stevens Honor System, which was how exams were administered at Stevens Institute of Technology. Basically, all work submitted, whether tests or homework, require a pledge with a signature that the work is your own and you didn't cheat. Violations of the honor system -- cheating, plagiarism, etc. could be reported by students or faculty and would be investigated by the Honor Board wit…
People are doing that at my institution. The average GPA increased by several points . The thing is, if it's perceived that it's easier to cheat than to learn, people will do that, honor system or not. I admit that there is a difference between an institutionalised honor system, designed with respect toward and in collaboration with students, and a last-minute arrangement by an unprepared organisation. Students have…
> The average GPA increased by several points.
The credibility of your school went down by the same amount.
If cheating is rampant, either the culture is broken or you are selecting students wrong.
Re: Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
#13Earlier quoted context omitted.
I spent a few years at Caltech in an academic role (not as a student). I never understood the rationale behind the unsupervised take-home exams. Could you elaborate what is it that makes it a 'success', in your opinion? The shortcomings that seem obvious to me are: - Penalizes honesty - Implied notion that Caltech students are "honourable" and honest. How is this achieved in practice?
The idea is that you create questions that are ungoogleable. Most of my upper-level CS courses had take-homes that were open-book, open-internet, and the professor basically said “good luck finding the answer to this problem online; you will not”. This is harder for professors to do, and maybe fails in intro courses, but generally is quite effective.
This.
Else you might as well call the degree "rote" because that's what you measure.
> maybe fails in intro courses
If someone cheats their way through intro courses they are up for a bad surprise since the upper level courses assumes a mastery of the intro classes!
Re: Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
#14Back in the good ol' days, you could just take the exam inside of a VM. The VM is locked down, but the host isn't. Looks like from ProctorU's docs[1] that they got around to probing for the (blatantly obvious[2]) signatures of a VM and stopped that trick. I wonder if those signatures exist in a Windows Sandbox[3] instance, or if you can detect/block the Enhanced RDP Session Windows leverages when running a Sandbox...…
I wonder how feasible it is to remove such fingerprints - find a way to make the VM be functionally indistinguishable from the host.
Re: Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
#15Back in the good ol' days, you could just take the exam inside of a VM. The VM is locked down, but the host isn't. Looks like from ProctorU's docs[1] that they got around to probing for the (blatantly obvious[2]) signatures of a VM and stopped that trick. I wonder if those signatures exist in a Windows Sandbox[3] instance, or if you can detect/block the Enhanced RDP Session Windows leverages when running a Sandbox...…
I wonder how feasible it is to remove such fingerprints - find a way to make the VM be functionally indistinguishable from the host.
This is an old problem for reverse engineers, and there are some solutions, for example VBoxHardenedLoader [0]. As per usual with such things, these tools are in cat/mouse category.
Re: Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
#16Folks are doing take-home exam wrong. Caltech had tremendous success with a culture of honesty and take-home exams.
I spent a few years at Caltech in an academic role (not as a student). I never understood the rationale behind the unsupervised take-home exams. Could you elaborate what is it that makes it a 'success', in your opinion? The shortcomings that seem obvious to me are: - Penalizes honesty - Implied notion that Caltech students are "honourable" and honest. How is this achieved in practice?
Regarding "penalizing honesty," I think it actually rewards honestly quite greatly—because of the Honor Code's importance in Caltech culture (i.e. one of the undergrad application essays is specifically about the Honor Code), it means that everyone gets to benefit from take-home exams.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that the "implied notion that Caltech students are... honest" is, in my experience, largely true (possibly because Caltech tries to select people who think the Honor Code is good from the get-go).
Re: Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
#17Earlier quoted context omitted.
I spent a few years at Caltech in an academic role (not as a student). I never understood the rationale behind the unsupervised take-home exams. Could you elaborate what is it that makes it a 'success', in your opinion? The shortcomings that seem obvious to me are: - Penalizes honesty - Implied notion that Caltech students are "honourable" and honest. How is this achieved in practice?
The idea is that you create questions that are ungoogleable. Most of my upper-level CS courses had take-homes that were open-book, open-internet, and the professor basically said “good luck finding the answer to this problem online; you will not”. This is harder for professors to do, and maybe fails in intro courses, but generally is quite effective.
One of my Ph 1b (freshman special relativity and electrostatics) quizzes guided you through "discovering" a new method of solving that type of problem. I don't remember the specific details, but it's one of the rare tests I've taken that I actually enjoyed!
Although most homeworks and exams aren't nearly that cool IME, they're virtually all about synthesis and fundamental understanding rather than rote memorization. This "first principles" approach to most everything is one of my favorite things about Caltech.
Re: Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
People are doing that at my institution. The average GPA increased by several points . The thing is, if it's perceived that it's easier to cheat than to learn, people will do that, honor system or not. I admit that there is a difference between an institutionalised honor system, designed with respect toward and in collaboration with students, and a last-minute arrangement by an unprepared organisation. Students have…
> The average GPA increased by several points. The credibility of your school went down by the same amount. If cheating is rampant, either the culture is broken or you are selecting students wrong.
> The credibility of your school went down by the same amount.
That was the point I was trying to make.
This is not a problem of a single school, or a single university. This is happening across the sector. The success of contract cheating websites, and the inability of universities worldwide to deal with them, attest to that.
> If cheating is rampant, either the culture is broken or you are selecting students wrong.
Sure. People are willing to risk jail to get their kids into top universities. A kid whose family borrowed money to send them study in a Western institution might not see honor as their top priority. It is not a student selection problem: the culture is broken all the way down.
Lest I come across as pessimistic, I am not. Academics may not be able to fix the structural problems, but we have more control over our own little part of our world than in the private sector. I, for one, don't rely on exams anymore for the time being and have not seen a GPA increase in my course. A honor-based exam system is not something I rely on, however.
Re: Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
#19Back in the good ol' days, you could just take the exam inside of a VM. The VM is locked down, but the host isn't. Looks like from ProctorU's docs[1] that they got around to probing for the (blatantly obvious[2]) signatures of a VM and stopped that trick. I wonder if those signatures exist in a Windows Sandbox[3] instance, or if you can detect/block the Enhanced RDP Session Windows leverages when running a Sandbox...…
Most of these applications simply look at your manufacturer if I'm remembering correctly (at the very most, it's one easily changeable property). You can generally get past these checks by setting any strings that reference VirtualBox or the likes to Dell.
Re: Students have to jump through absurd hoops to use exam monitoring software
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
I spent a few years at Caltech in an academic role (not as a student). I never understood the rationale behind the unsupervised take-home exams. Could you elaborate what is it that makes it a 'success', in your opinion? The shortcomings that seem obvious to me are: - Penalizes honesty - Implied notion that Caltech students are "honourable" and honest. How is this achieved in practice?
The idea is that you create questions that are ungoogleable. Most of my upper-level CS courses had take-homes that were open-book, open-internet, and the professor basically said “good luck finding the answer to this problem online; you will not”. This is harder for professors to do, and maybe fails in intro courses, but generally is quite effective.
I think the most important part of "proctoring" exams should be that it is individual work. Let's face it- you will almost always have access to the internet. The only thing that should matter is that the assigned student can solve the problem _in some manner._ This may include the internet, notes, or really anything.
The real problem is people paying others to take exams, or simply copying answers from others. I work as an independent tutor, and I get contacted far too much by people looking to have me take their exams for them.