Why I will never pursue cheating again • Hacker News Board

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#331

Post by gommm » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 11:20 AM UTC

roel_v wrote: post #304

gommm wrote: post #232

" Suggestions to change completely the assignments from year to year are appealing on the first sight but they cause others types of problems: It is very difficult to know in advance if an assignment is going to be too easy, too hard, or too ambiguous. Even small-scale testing with TA's and other faculty does not help. You need to "test" the new assignment by giving it to students. If it is a good one, you want to ke…

And in other news, I have first-hand reports from a professor in France using the same exam since the 1980's, each year using copies of the original version formatted with a typewriter. My university has a lot of rules too, and the majority are worthless.

Well it also depends of the university... École d'Ingénieurs (Engineering Schools, it's a bit different from the american system) tend to be stricter about that while universities in France are less strict.

I know for a fact that no exam were reused because the previous years exams were available at the library for students who wanted to study... Since most of the exams were open book, with a world problem to solve in about 3 hours, they were actually fun to study from.

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#332

Post by athst » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 11:28 AM UTC

bluehat wrote: post #134

A housemate of mine had a very creative solution: as a teacher he said that he would give anybody who cheated a 0 and that appeals could be filed with the Dean's office to prove they did not cheat. Most importantly, nobody would be told if they had been caught cheating, the zero would just show up on their grades. The system plays on the student's mind: when they submit the first assignment and cheat their motivation…

That's pretty awesome - it's like The Tell-Tale Heart way of dealing with cheaters

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#333

Post by dkersten » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 11:31 AM UTC

tommi wrote: post #330

dkersten wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I felt that I am teaching a class full of kids that come just for the grade, and not for learning. From reading your blog post and your comments here, I got the impression that you cared more about your pay raise than about the students learning. Now, I'll be the first to admit that I could have misinterpreted whats been said and that you were probably a victim of circumstance, but you blame the guy for demonstrating…

I got a different impression from the blog post. Being a teacher does not mean you have to do charity. Everybody needs to get some food on their table. I can relate to that being rewarded less because of something you feel you were not responsible, makes you feel upset. However, I didn't get the impression that it's all he cares about. It was just one paragraph among many after all.

Similarly the part where the student cared most about the grade was only one paragraph among many after all.

I'm more arguing that the professor should treat his students under the same standards he wants to be treated and from the article AND his comments here (reading the article alone gave me a similar impression as what you wrote, kind of), he seems to be quick to blame the students without accepting his own shortcomings (not entirely true - he does acknowledge some and I do agree with how he intends on tackling cheating in the future: by changing the homework format to a more cheat-resistant form). I know I was a bit harsh in my comment, but I do get the sense that the prof is bitter and unapologetic for most of his own mistakes.

Still, I wish him luck in the next semester. I imagine the new homework format should help alleviate a lot of the problems he had and avoid this in the future.

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#334

Post by cbs » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 11:34 AM UTC

badclient wrote: post #252

btilly wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think being pissed at 28/108 students is a valid excuse for acting pissed at everyone. That is a major professional flaw and a post on how you plan to control your emotion may be appreciated by future students. FYI professionals are humans first and professionals second. If think that professionals can easily turn off how they are feeling and always act properly, then I conclude that you have little understan…

It goes both ways. Are you willing to listen to the many excuses for why each student may have plagiarized and potentially extend the same they-are-human-too sympathies?

>Are you willing to listen to the many excuses for why each student may have plagiarized and potentially extend the same they-are-human-too sympathies?

Unless their reason for cheating is "I don't care about my studies" and the way you extend your sympathies is by getting them kicked out, your argument is bullshit.

OK, the professor sucked. You know what? Some do, thats life, and you suck it up. The academic policy doesn't say "you have a right to a teacher you love a whole huggy bunch", but it does say "don't fucking cheat".

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#335

Post by hpguy » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 11:41 AM UTC

aik wrote: post #191

From the post: "My role is to educate and teach, not to enforce honest behavior. This is a university, not a kindergarten." In my opinion this is one of the primary issues with a lot of teachers: I don't believe a teacher's job is specifically to narrowly teach the subject matter at hand, but more broadly teach the student whatever it takes to assist the student in succeeding in life, and especially within their give…

I'm a university teacher myself. I typically teach a hundred students every semester. Don't you think it's a bit too much to expect me to do whatever it takes to assure each and every of my student, including cheaters, to succeed in life? That's noble, but too much for any individual.

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#336

Post by athst » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 11:42 AM UTC

I know this is an indirect solution, but why even have papers in a business course anyway? I was a business undergrad, and after all of the lower-level BS classes, it was all about projects and discussions in class, not paper writing. Any long-form writing I had to do was in-class writing essays and stuff on exams, where you can't copy paste.

I know a lot of the CS people on here look down on business education, but the real value in it is not learning specific facts like "what is WiMax" but instead being able to work on a team to create something and being able to communicate and discuss business problems intelligently.

The team projects and case study discussions is really where I learned things. Traditional assignments in a business course don't really make a lot of sense.

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#337

Post by demallien » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 11:44 AM UTC

Panos wrote: post #253

nyustern wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First off, many of the details you cited are inaccurate. However, its pointless to argue over such things. I was not aware of your health condition, but given the pattern of treatment given to me and a handful of others, I was left to assume you were acting as usual. Anyway, my post was to make you aware of a few other reasons as to why you received a low evaluation score. Blaming the students wholly is unjust and th…

Again: read the article until the end. I do not blame the students. Students respond to incentives. If I give them opportunities to cheat and remain undetected, they will cheat. I do the same as a human. If I were getting a 50% increase in my salary for detecting cheating so aggressively, next year I would have tried to detect cheating even when there is none. What I truly blame in the article is the structure of the…

OK, here's something that I don't get. Why do you care that students are cheating? In the end, the only people they are harming is themselves - leave them to it, I say... You are there to teach them, if they decline to learn, hey it's not your problem.

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#338

Post by gizmo » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 11:57 AM UTC

nyustern wrote: post #189

Hi Panos. I was actually a student in your class last fall semester. To alleviate any doubt you may have, the class was known as “Info Tech,” and you had two sessions on Mondays and Wednesdays (2-3:15, 3:30-4:45 pm) in KMEC. Now I have a couple of problems with your post. Firstly, you attribute your lower evaluation rating of 5.3 for last fall semester solely to your lower tolerance of cheating. However, there is som…

> what really irks me about your post is your complacence with cheating because it’s not in your self-interest to pursue those who cheated

Why don't you hold the other professors to the same standard? It's not as if the other professors are oblivious to rampant cheating. But what's the point of trying to catch cheaters if it hurts the class dynamic and if those who get caught don't even get suspended? The students are clearly OK with cheating otherwise the cheaters would be ostracized by the other students. The school management clearly doesn't care, since they don't take action against those who are caught red-handed. The teachers who care are punished for it: bad reviews and bad class atmosphere in return for extra hours on top of an already heavy schedule. And yet you don't thank the professor for trying to fight against cheaters (and losing that fight) but you effectively criticize him for having tried in the first place!

> discussed it and concluded you were just racist

A teacher is in a bad mood when a significant portion of the class is exposed as having no academic integrity, doesn't want to teach the class but still, according to your own words was a "great teacher in the classroom" and "gave good lectures". How do you explain his bad mood? Why of course, he must be racist.

> all the students had received your email demanding those who plagiarized to come in to talk to you, naturally everyone, even those who didn’t cheat, felt very uneasy and worried

This exact scenario happened in a class I attended some years back. Guess who felt nervous? Those who knew they cheated on the assignment and those who plagiarized habitually but didn't remember whether they plagiarized in this instance. The students who would never, ever, ever, copy-paste plagiarize did not feel the slightest bit worried. I'm sure you "collaborated" with a friend on a small part of the assignment. Yeah, that's the word all cheaters and plagiarizers use.

> teaching evaluations don’t just measure your ability to give good lectures

If you give a better evaluation to mediocre teachers who smile and say sorry when they're late, then that's exactly the kind of teachers you're going to get instead of the teachers who are great in the classroom and who teach classes where you learned a lot.

Save your post and re-read it a few years from now. You'll probably be able to see it from a different perspective.

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#339

Post by astine » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 12:09 PM UTC

demallien wrote: post #337

Panos wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again: read the article until the end. I do not blame the students. Students respond to incentives. If I give them opportunities to cheat and remain undetected, they will cheat. I do the same as a human. If I were getting a 50% increase in my salary for detecting cheating so aggressively, next year I would have tried to detect cheating even when there is none. What I truly blame in the article is the structure of the…

OK, here's something that I don't get. Why do you care that students are cheating? In the end, the only people they are harming is themselves - leave them to it, I say... You are there to teach them, if they decline to learn, hey it's not your problem.

"In the end, the only people they are harming is themselves "

No they're not. Grades are important in moving on in academia and moving on one's career ultimately. Cheaters are hurting other students by out-competing them on graduate entry exams and job applications. They hurt their prospective employers by not learning and out-competing competent students for jobs, (possibly becoming one of those jerks you read about on TDWTF.) And, they hurt their school's reputation by lowering the average quality of the graduate. Cheater's hurt everyone else in the system.

Re: Why I will never pursue cheating again

#340

Post by neworder » Mon, Jul 18, 2011, 12:20 PM UTC

justin_vanw wrote: post #126

ohashi wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It amazes me that you cannot see it from his perspective. He tried to catch cheaters and was punished by the school system for it. He earned less money for trying to enforce a no cheating policy. Would you work twice the amount of time for less pay? Most of us probably wouldn't. It seems like a prudent financial decision for him. The problem seems systemic, he throws his hands in the air and gives up because he canno…

Since you asked, I would refuse to work anywhere that I was expected to stand aside and ignore fraud, or where I was punished for doing what everyone would agree is the right thing, in this case trying to catch and identify cheaters in compliance with the rules of the institution . I would rail against it every day and try to change the system by doing the right thing and calling out other faculty for not doing so, p…

>I would refuse to work anywhere that I was expected to stand aside and ignore fraud, or where I was punished for doing what everyone would agree is the right thing (...)

You don't always have that much choice, do you?

>I would rail against it every day and try to change the system by doing the right thing and calling out other faculty for not doing so, publicly.

Yeah.

You will not simply fail, you'll get screwed by the system at the first opportunity. If you really want to "buck the system", cool down and watch some episodes of "The Wire". This series portays exactly and reallisticaly the inner workings of corrupt institutions and what happens to "lone wolves" trying to beat or change the system (spoiler - they get screwed by superiors and peers alike and achieve absolutely nothing).

I'm not saying it's impossible to transform the system from within. But trying to do it single-handedly is fighting a losing battle that is doomed to alienate your coworkers.