Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered • Hacker News Board

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#81

Post by its_so_creative » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:41 PM UTC

edw519 wrote: post #42

Actually, this is valuable data. As a potential employer, I care more about the candidate's ethics (or lack thereof) than their ability. I could always teach them, but I could never trust them. Coursera should just publicly identify cheaters so I can cross check against resumes or certifications. Problem solved.

unless it turns out (in physical reality, this is not an ethical statement) that the social creatures who would selflessly upload whatever they worked on for the benefit of their peers, without giving a shit about the ethics program of their schools, turn out to be better employees than those who would never do such a thing.

is such a thing possible? I am not saying one way or another. I am saying it's not the be-all, end-all signal, and you should prove that it even goes in the direction you suggest. :)

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#82

Post by ZeroGravitas » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:43 PM UTC

I would have went the other way and forced everyone to develop in public via github (or similar, in fact it wouldn't need to be private if Coursera had access to the git repository). I'd guess it would be more work to try and painstakingly recreate a unique and authentic looking sequence of commits than it would to just do it yourself, probably teach some good habits too.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#83

Post by eneveu » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:43 PM UTC

blaines wrote: post #59

edw519 wrote: post #42

Actually, this is valuable data. As a potential employer, I care more about the candidate's ethics (or lack thereof) than their ability. I could always teach them, but I could never trust them. Coursera should just publicly identify cheaters so I can cross check against resumes or certifications. Problem solved.

It's possible students (ignorantly) made their work public because they were proud of their accomplishments. I've done that once or twice under the assumption the course would change for other classes, if only slightly. That being said, the onus is on the student to make sure they aren't submitting someone's work as their own. I'm not really sure if they understood what they were doing was serious (as in if Coursera…

I remember being presented with the Honor Code directly when I started the course. I don't remember if it was a popup or during the introduction video, but it was definitely highlighted.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#84

Post by DennisP » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:45 PM UTC

If they're going to issue certificates that people respect, they should do it like EdX is planning: paid formal testing at exam centers.

For connecting top students with recruiters, they're already looking at contributions to forums as well as homework/test scores. It shouldn't be too hard to see who's really engaged with the material.

Getting uptight about people sharing work seems counterproductive and hopeless.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#85

Post by blaines » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:46 PM UTC

eneveu wrote: post #83

blaines wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's possible students (ignorantly) made their work public because they were proud of their accomplishments. I've done that once or twice under the assumption the course would change for other classes, if only slightly. That being said, the onus is on the student to make sure they aren't submitting someone's work as their own. I'm not really sure if they understood what they were doing was serious (as in if Coursera…

I remember being presented with the Honor Code directly when I started the course. I don't remember if it was a popup or during the introduction video, but it was definitely highlighted.

Oh okay, I took a course and have no memory of being presented with the Honor Code. The one they linked to is in their ToS, it still deserves it's own page.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#86

Post by Permit » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:47 PM UTC

edw519 wrote: post #42

Actually, this is valuable data. As a potential employer, I care more about the candidate's ethics (or lack thereof) than their ability. I could always teach them, but I could never trust them. Coursera should just publicly identify cheaters so I can cross check against resumes or certifications. Problem solved.

>Coursera should just publicly identify cheaters so I can cross check against resumes or certifications. Problem solved.

This introduces a lot of problems, all of which are difficult to solve and not directly related to the fundamental vision of Coursera. If I cheat under the full name of my sworn enemy, I can have them publicly blacklisted from any employer who uses this list. Identification seems like the logical next step, but it's no easy task especially when your students come from hundreds of different countries with varying forms of ID.

If you're serious in your suggestion, you're going to have to explain how these kinds of problems can be solved. You're then going to have the same problem Google+ had with online identities. Why should one be forced to give their real identity if they're simply trying to learn, not to be recognized for it?

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#87

Post by wpietri » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:47 PM UTC

pawelwentpawel wrote: post #46

Permit wrote: post #31

I'm of the opinion that the value of Coursera's courses comes from the learning opportunity, not the certification. I think they should simply allow cheating and not issue certificates. Alternatively, allow cheating and continue to issue certificates while letting employers decide the true value of the certificates. The point of Coursera (to me) isn't to pad my resume, it's to learn from courses not always offered at…

Just wondering - would you put a certificate from Coursera on your resume? I raised this question a while ago in here : http://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/2074/showing-co... Also - cases will be handled on an individual basis - I guess it's not a standard sized class. There is a few hundred people signed up at least. Putting up a free course in functional programming seems like a lot of work. On top of that…

As an employer, I take continuing education of any sort as a positive sign when looking at resumes. Software development is a Red Queen field; one has to keep up.

However, I do take most certifications as mild negative signs. E.g., SCJP, CSM, PMP. A lot of for-profit certifications are worthless. A notable exception are some of the Cisco certs, which really put people through their paces. Which makes sense, as Cisco benefits more from having expensive Cisco products work well than from certification revenue.

It'll be interesting to see what bucket Coursera certs fall into. They need to jump on the cheating thing right quick, though.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#88

Post by wololo » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:53 PM UTC

jmduke wrote: post #38

Permit wrote: post #31

I'm of the opinion that the value of Coursera's courses comes from the learning opportunity, not the certification. I think they should simply allow cheating and not issue certificates. Alternatively, allow cheating and continue to issue certificates while letting employers decide the true value of the certificates. The point of Coursera (to me) isn't to pad my resume, it's to learn from courses not always offered at…

I completely agree, which is why I find the cheating so interesting. I strongly doubt that any employers are going to lend much value to the certification so early in Coursera's lifespan, but I don't doubt that cheating is going to continue even though the only thing you 'truly' gain from a Coursera course is knowledge.

From a practical standpoint, while it's disappointing, I don't understand why they are so surprised that solutions were posted online.

I mean, if there are 5000 students in the course, for even odds of it happening, 0.5 = (1 - n) ^ 5000 -> n = 0.0139% chance per student, which seems like an awfully saintly ratio to assume.

Won't they be making the problem worse by drawing borderline cheaters' attention to it (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect)?

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#89

Post by Inufu » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:53 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #76

jonknee wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's "cheating" though in the sense that it's against a TOS on a website, but tons of things are against a TOS and almost no one reads them. They're pretending to be one, but Coursera is not a college, is not accredited and does not hand out degrees. This is a free online self-study course being taken by hundreds of thousands of people with varying degrees of seriousness. Some people may treat it like a college cours…

If people sign up for a course like this and then turn in work they copied from the Internet, I definitely don't want to hire them. Even if they weren't after the certificate. That's like cheating at solitaire. It's just sad. Also, do you have any evidence that the no-cheating, no-publishing-homework policy is buried in a TOS? If Coursera hasn't made it obvious enough, then sure, people could have made a mistake. But…

As someone taking the course - yes, it was pretty obvious. And even if he had said nothing, it's common sense that uploading other's solutions as your own is frowned upon.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#90

Post by SystemOut » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 3:54 PM UTC

blaines wrote: post #59

edw519 wrote: post #42

Actually, this is valuable data. As a potential employer, I care more about the candidate's ethics (or lack thereof) than their ability. I could always teach them, but I could never trust them. Coursera should just publicly identify cheaters so I can cross check against resumes or certifications. Problem solved.

It's possible students (ignorantly) made their work public because they were proud of their accomplishments. I've done that once or twice under the assumption the course would change for other classes, if only slightly. That being said, the onus is on the student to make sure they aren't submitting someone's work as their own. I'm not really sure if they understood what they were doing was serious (as in if Coursera…

They definitely showed the honor code the first time I went into this class as well as a different class I took on modeling.

I think the expelling is totally fine. Martin and his team put a lot of time into this, developing the course and the tools to automate grading and if someone is going to put this up publicly and not take it down they should just boot them from the course.

I don't understand why anyone would actually turn in the same work, though. It's not like a completion certificate from this class will get you closer to a degree or anything. I'm sure there must be some reason and I hope it's more than just "I wanted a 10/10 for me to see!". I suppose that an employer might tell someone "learn Scala and get that certificate and get a 10/10 on every assignment" but I somehow doubt it.