College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software • Hacker News Board

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#41

Post by jbob2000 » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:03 PM UTC

parzivalm wrote: post #25

The thing that has always frustrated me about anti-cheating/anti-plagiarism software is that it almost always only hurts people that did something by accident or unintentionally. When I took the one kubernetes certification exam as part of an old job, you used software like this and at one point I leaned too close to the screen and the proctor couldn't see my face and that got me flagged. People that want to cheat or…

My partner recently finished her PhD and has started working as a medical writer. During her academic career, it was beat into her head don’t plagiarize, everything must be yours.

In her first review after a few weeks on the job, her manager says that she takes too long to do her work; they just need her to take what the client says verbatim, fact check it, and then slap it in a document. She was treating her work like an academic assignment and putting in the effort to craft something unique, when they really just need a fact checking typist.

8 years in higher ed, published study on cancer drugs, thousands of mice died, millions of dollars spent on the lab... all so she can transcribe some text and then validate it against the studies.

Academia is the worst job training program ever.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#42

Post by TrackerFF » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:05 PM UTC

serjester wrote: post #10

From the many students I know, I can tell you that cheating is rampant in online learning. The average GPA has gone up 0.3 points at my alma mater. I don't think people understand just how widespread it is. This software isn't ideal but there's no good solutions here short of major rethink of how these classes, and possible all of the college, is structured.

At least where I'm from (Norway), grade transcripts will show a class grade distribution/histogram in the background of your grade.

That way the viewer / reader will be able to compare your results to your class.

Obviously if 80% of your class got A, that A is not going to look as impressive.

On the other hand, if you're the only student that got A, while the class distribution is monotonically increasing towards Failure, that's going to be a good thing for you.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#43

Post by hahamrfunnyguy » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:05 PM UTC

Using this software sounds idiotic. They're trying to apply methods to in-person learning to distance learning. Instead of focusing on detecting cheating, they should be re-evaluating their grading and teaching methodology so that cheating is unproductive. Prioritize in class participation and essay writing. If tests are needed, they can be timed and open book.

Great example of why our educational system isn't all that good.

I took a year of Japanese in college. A big part of the grade was memorizing and performing these dialogs. If you didn't remember the dialog word for word, you'd get points off. I wasted a lot of time trying to memorize those stupid things when I could have been acquiring new vocabulary words or studying Kanji. I took a trip to Japan a couple of years go, and did some brushing up for a couple of months before I left. I learned more in those two months than I did in my entire time at school.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#44

Post by querez » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:06 PM UTC

parzivalm wrote: post #25

The thing that has always frustrated me about anti-cheating/anti-plagiarism software is that it almost always only hurts people that did something by accident or unintentionally. When I took the one kubernetes certification exam as part of an old job, you used software like this and at one point I leaned too close to the screen and the proctor couldn't see my face and that got me flagged. People that want to cheat or…

> One of the issues is also just academia being so hyper-focused on thinking everyone is there to become an academic which is not the case for the vast majority of people

I'm not sure I follow why this is bad. I think academic rigor and being a decent scholar, as well as being able to parse and produce research are good things (and in my mind, those are the corner stones of being an academic). Did misunderstand you?

FWIW, in germany (and likely other european countries) we have a two tier system for higher education, consisting of universities and "applied universities", with the latter focusing on applied skills and the former focusing on research, which in think is sensible.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#45

Post by nullspace » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:08 PM UTC

cipherzero wrote: post #39

supportlocal4h wrote: post #34

If a prof needs a final exam to be able to assess a student's proficiency, they are doing it wrong.

Not saying you’re wrong, but what are you proposing as an alternative? How should comprehensive knowledge be tested? Weekly homework/projects? P.s. love the user name.

For my Masters degree, most of my courses were absolutely like this. Our assignments were difficult and heavy. There was no expectation that you should complete them without Google or reference material.

In contrast, the "final exams" were either non-existent or extremely easy and account for only 10-20% of the grade, where they existed.

I really liked this approach. Make your assignments very difficult. Alternatively, give difficult 10-15 minute quizzes every other week. IMO, it's a much better way of evaluating students.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#46

Post by pwinnski » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:08 PM UTC

RegnisGnaw wrote: post #37

parzivalm wrote: post #25

The thing that has always frustrated me about anti-cheating/anti-plagiarism software is that it almost always only hurts people that did something by accident or unintentionally. When I took the one kubernetes certification exam as part of an old job, you used software like this and at one point I leaned too close to the screen and the proctor couldn't see my face and that got me flagged. People that want to cheat or…

>> People that want to cheat or game the system will find ways, it isn't hard to do. As someone who taught a college, that's a flawed statement. Let me propose this to you. You teach Calculus 1000 and there is an end of term exam. Your normal end of term exam is one where everyone sits in the same room, proctors are looking for cheats, things checked, etc. Instead this year you tell your students that this year it wi…

The idea that an honor code is enough is belied by the fact that software like this catches cheaters, no?

I mean, we're obviously upset about false positives, and we should be. But I'm presuming that some people are caught who were cheating, and without the software they would have cheated and not been caught.

We can suggest that with an honor code in place, maybe some of those cheating students would have not cheated, because... I mean, if they were willing to cheat with software in place, I'm not sure why would have been deterred by an honor code.

I think in about 98-99% of cases, people who claim an honor code prevents cheating are deluding themselves. Yeah, if you don't have any way of catching cheaters, then you can pretend you have a 0% cheating rate. But it's pretend.

P.S. I'm not speaking for my employer at all.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#47

Post by ghaff » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:09 PM UTC

ht_th wrote: post #31

jccalhoun wrote: post #17

I'm a professor in the humanities so I can write tests that make it harder to cheat than some other fields. I cringe whenever I hear someone using these invasive kinds of software. There has to be a better way than making students install spyware.

Sure. Have at most ten to twenty students per teacher. Then the teacher can spend a couple of hours per student to assess their understanding. Unfortunately, in education quantity seems to be prioritized over quality. When you have over 50 students, let alone over 200 hundred, good luck grading authentic open-ended projects or papers in just two weeks. As a result, most tests consists of multiple-choice questions and…

> Then the teacher can spend a couple of hours per student to assess their understanding.

That sounds as if you're steering close to a whiteboarding interview which a lot of people will claim isn't great.

Take home tests aren't perfect but I had plenty of them in school. And even when I didn't I don't think I had just about any engineering class that didn't assign problem sets that counted for a decent portion of your grade. If you can do take-home problem sets, you can do a take-home exam.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#48

Post by parzivalm » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:09 PM UTC

RegnisGnaw wrote: post #37

parzivalm wrote: post #25

The thing that has always frustrated me about anti-cheating/anti-plagiarism software is that it almost always only hurts people that did something by accident or unintentionally. When I took the one kubernetes certification exam as part of an old job, you used software like this and at one point I leaned too close to the screen and the proctor couldn't see my face and that got me flagged. People that want to cheat or…

>> People that want to cheat or game the system will find ways, it isn't hard to do. As someone who taught a college, that's a flawed statement. Let me propose this to you. You teach Calculus 1000 and there is an end of term exam. Your normal end of term exam is one where everyone sits in the same room, proctors are looking for cheats, things checked, etc. Instead this year you tell your students that this year it wi…

I perhaps wasn't clear enough but I meant solely when it comes to these type of anti-cheat systems being used. Obviously it would be different for in-person vs remote/take home.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#49

Post by raxxorrax » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:10 PM UTC

tomp wrote: post #26

jccalhoun wrote: post #17

I'm a professor in the humanities so I can write tests that make it harder to cheat than some other fields. I cringe whenever I hear someone using these invasive kinds of software. There has to be a better way than making students install spyware.

> I can write tests that make it harder to cheat than some other fields This might be my prejudice speaking (I studied math) but isn't this basically because grading is that much more subjective? So it would cut both ways, harder to cheat but also less objective / impartial assuming no cheating.

My university does a lot of oral math exams. After failing 3 times you have the option for an oral test as a last chance and people do indeed fail math in large numbers.

I was on the other side as an academic assistant for a few days (no role in testing) and I can tell you that oral math exams about algebra can be as hard as you want them to be, especially if you have problems with tests and get nervous. You have to take drugs against that.

The prof I had was a bit of a dick but he was really good at measuring how well you understood the concepts and if you ware able to apply them to problems.

Re: College students are learning hard lessons about anti-cheating software

#50

Post by read_if_gay_ » Mon, Nov 30, 2020, 4:12 PM UTC

andreilys wrote: post #20

ghaff wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Certainly I had many take-home exams in college and grad school. (Of course, I had many proctored in-person exams too.) So one solution is to switch to open book take home exams as much as possible. The other frankly is to have an honor code and, at some point, recognize that some people will cheat but they're mostly hurting themselves.

Scholarships, internships and grad school spots are a scarce resource. Students who cheat can secure a higher GPA with less effort. That effort can be redirected towards looking for internships and improving grad school applications. So I fail to see how cheaters are only “hurting themselves”. Morality aside, if you pursue a cheating strategy your pay-off will be much higher when we consider the scarcity of resources…

> Students who cheat can secure a higher GPA with less effort. That effort can be redirected towards looking for internships and improving grad school applications.

This is definitely not the reason why most people cheat.

> Morality aside, if you pursue a cheating strategy your pay-off will be much higher

As with any kind of lie, you will have to cheat more and more to compensate for previous cheating, and eventually your little web of lies will come back and bite you in the ass.