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Coping with Copilot

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Re: Coping with Copilot

#41

Post by Invictus0 »

TakeBlaster16 wrote: post #18
muzani wrote: post #10

This reminds me of when my school teacher insisted that real engineers didn't use calculators. They'd calculate their sines and cosines from a table. 3 years later, the education ministry decided that was BS and let everyone bring calculators to math exams. Surprisingly, math scores didn't go up much.

I had to deal with this too. "You're not going to go through life with a calculator in your pocket!"

I've seen people take this to the extreme and literally be unable to do basic fractions and percentages either in their head or on paper.

Re: Coping with Copilot

#42

Post by chiefalchemist »

spcebar wrote: post #11

Cheating is getting easier by the day, but the bottom line is that if the student is cheating, they're probably not absorbing the coursework (or if they are cheating and absorbing the coursework, there might be something wrong with the coursework). The most effective policy might not be to try and mechanically prevent cheating, but to explain that, this is information that you're going to need if you actually want to…

True story. I got my CS degree pre-internet. I did well with programming. Some of my friends / peers were less talented. In one of my 300 level courses the assignment was more difficult than usual. I naturally figued it out. They struggled.

Evetually I gave a copy of my code / solution to Friends Group A and also to another Group B. They didn't know each other. I said, "Be careful! If you copy, disguise it."* Deadline comes. Everyone hands in their work.

The following week, we go to lecture. Prof walks in and writes a list of names on the board. I knew each name. I knew what was happening. I waited for the shoe to drop (i.e., my name on the list). The shoe never dropped**

I believe they were all given Ds. Not sure why they didn't fail (F).

* In retrospect, this was a stupid on my part. If they knew how to alter enough it's likely they'd be able to write it themselves. That is, I all but suggested they walk on water.

** Also in retrospect, the TAs + prof had to realize I was the source. The class was big but not that big. And if only some completed the assignment correctly, the source had to be not difficult to identify. I'm not sure why I was never pulled aside and spoken to. Thank gawd.

Re: Coping with Copilot

#43

Post by hospadar »

I've always thought that the ability to communicate to other humans about programs and to be able to synthesize a conceptual understanding from looking at code are highly valuable and sometimes-overlooked in the workplace. Assignments to write a function don't really demonstrate either skill.

Maybe more assignments like:

- "Here is a function that is supposed to generate a fibonacci sequence, but it is not correct, explain why"

- Here is a sort function. What is the name of the algorithm implemented by this sort function?

The reality of any career in CS is going to involve a lot of maintenance/understanding of existing code any systems. Copilot's failure to replace all human programmers isn't because of it's inability to cough up complex code, it's because it can't communicate with the product owner, debug a program amidst a time-sensitive incident, or explain its work.

Re: Coping with Copilot

#44

Post by leeoniya »

russfink wrote: post #31
spcebar wrote: post #11

Cheating is getting easier by the day, but the bottom line is that if the student is cheating, they're probably not absorbing the coursework (or if they are cheating and absorbing the coursework, there might be something wrong with the coursework). The most effective policy might not be to try and mechanically prevent cheating, but to explain that, this is information that you're going to need if you actually want to…

Adjunct instructor here. Before I came into the program, cheating was on the rise. When given programming assignments, students would go to Geeks for geeks and download solutions, some of them mostly correct, and submit those for credit. One remedy was to try to make programming assignments harder and harder. Eventually, they got so hard that we were asking people new to computer science to implement a full arbitrary…

> one addition to programming assignments includes an analysis write up.

when i was interviewing candidates this was the fastest way to filter those who understood and those who didnt.

ask someone to talk you through how to solve some real-life problem. to look at a stack trace and describe what they see, or to run a profile and trace through the cause of a hotspot/contention. show them an issue and have them live debug to root-cause and fix. it's okay if they use the internet, SO, etc. -- that's how we all do it. see what they have to look up! just listening to the amount of depth someone can verbally communicate during novel problem solving (including additional questions they ask you) turns a 60min interview that wastes time into a 10min one that tells you if you can move on.

a favorite one of mine was to ask the candidate to describe in as much detail as possible what happens between a keystroke typed into a google search box and the search results appearing. the diversity of replies is facinating. some will tell you "google returns results from its database", others will ask you if you want them to first describe how the keyboard works at an electrical level through the USB or bluetooth driver stack.

"Never memorize something that you can look up." --someone smart

Re: Coping with Copilot

#45

Post by mdaniel »

russfink wrote: post #31
spcebar wrote: post #11

Cheating is getting easier by the day, but the bottom line is that if the student is cheating, they're probably not absorbing the coursework (or if they are cheating and absorbing the coursework, there might be something wrong with the coursework). The most effective policy might not be to try and mechanically prevent cheating, but to explain that, this is information that you're going to need if you actually want to…

Adjunct instructor here. Before I came into the program, cheating was on the rise. When given programming assignments, students would go to Geeks for geeks and download solutions, some of them mostly correct, and submit those for credit. One remedy was to try to make programming assignments harder and harder. Eventually, they got so hard that we were asking people new to computer science to implement a full arbitrary…

> but also class discussions and group participation

I really, really hated those parts of school, second only to group projects. I do appreciate why teachers want that, and I hear you about how it can surface those who are cheating, but I do wonder if it's causing the class to suffer for the alleged misdeeds of a few

Re: Coping with Copilot

#46

Post by moffkalast »

jefftk wrote: post #21
fancyfredbot wrote: post #6

I get that copilot is AI and pretty cool, but students could look up a Fibonacci program on Google before it existed. What's more these algorithms are written in books. If students wanted to cheat on your "write depth first search" assignment then they already were.

I think the big change here is how much easier it is? Students, like everyone else, are lazy. Previously just doing the assignment was typically less work than cheating, and Copilot makes that much less common.

Type the assignment into google and press enter vs type it as a comment and press tab?

Seems roughly the same amount of effort, and since Copilot is not free anymore most students won't bother paying for access on any kind of scale that matters. Whoever was going to cheat will cheat regardless.

Besides it's one of those "you won't have a calculator with you everyday" fallacies. If you can solve problems with Copilot in class you can also do it at your job later on.

Re: Coping with Copilot

#48

Post by philipswood »

russfink wrote: post #31
spcebar wrote: post #11

Cheating is getting easier by the day, but the bottom line is that if the student is cheating, they're probably not absorbing the coursework (or if they are cheating and absorbing the coursework, there might be something wrong with the coursework). The most effective policy might not be to try and mechanically prevent cheating, but to explain that, this is information that you're going to need if you actually want to…

Adjunct instructor here. Before I came into the program, cheating was on the rise. When given programming assignments, students would go to Geeks for geeks and download solutions, some of them mostly correct, and submit those for credit. One remedy was to try to make programming assignments harder and harder. Eventually, they got so hard that we were asking people new to computer science to implement a full arbitrary…

When playing with GPT-3, I've found it to be impressively good at explaining what code does in English...

Re: Coping with Copilot

#49

Post by ethbr0 »

mdaniel wrote: post #45
russfink wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adjunct instructor here. Before I came into the program, cheating was on the rise. When given programming assignments, students would go to Geeks for geeks and download solutions, some of them mostly correct, and submit those for credit. One remedy was to try to make programming assignments harder and harder. Eventually, they got so hard that we were asking people new to computer science to implement a full arbitrary…

> but also class discussions and group participation I really, really hated those parts of school, second only to group projects. I do appreciate why teachers want that, and I hear you about how it can surface those who are cheating, but I do wonder if it's causing the class to suffer for the alleged misdeeds of a few

I disliked them in school, for the usual reasons, but found them the most useful exercises for developing career skills.

No person an island.

And if they are, I don't want to be on a work team with them.

Re: Coping with Copilot

#50

Post by aaomidi »

russfink wrote: post #31
spcebar wrote: post #11

Cheating is getting easier by the day, but the bottom line is that if the student is cheating, they're probably not absorbing the coursework (or if they are cheating and absorbing the coursework, there might be something wrong with the coursework). The most effective policy might not be to try and mechanically prevent cheating, but to explain that, this is information that you're going to need if you actually want to…

Adjunct instructor here. Before I came into the program, cheating was on the rise. When given programming assignments, students would go to Geeks for geeks and download solutions, some of them mostly correct, and submit those for credit. One remedy was to try to make programming assignments harder and harder. Eventually, they got so hard that we were asking people new to computer science to implement a full arbitrary…

I do want to say that, those criteria exclude neurodivergent folk (who for many reasons may have never even been diagnosed).

Honestly I think moving away from grades is going to be the way forward. Part of this is also making university, etc cheaper so you’re not financially incentivized to not take a class one, or multiple more times.

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