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

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#111

Post by robotresearcher » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:33 PM UTC

Universities put a lot of time and effort into managing cheating, and we surely only scratch the surface. This is soul-crushing, no-fun, give-up-and-work-at-Google kind of work for professors. Everyone hates it.

The decision we have to make is the level of resources to put in. We've tried emphasizing the honor code and putting resources into teaching quality. This leads to endemic cheating. We've tried cracking down very hard on detection, and this leads to massive work for the instructors, lots of busted students and a general "meh" from the administration. Finding the right balance is really tough.

I don't get it - it never occurred to me to cheat as an undergrad. But then I had UK-style end of year finals instead of homework-heavy classes and constant grading, and I was never optimizing GPA from class to class. There are problems with mega-finals for some students, but they sure make cheating hard.

The online services can't possibly defeat cheating. The main defence they can have is proctored exams at physical locations, which kills some of the online advantage, and even then they have the ID problem. The Open University has worked out how to deal with this pretty well but it's not cheap. The new online services can and should be different to this, and focus on the massive ultra-low-cost learning opportunities. It's going to be interesting to see if they come up with something really new, and not just distance-ed 3.0.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#112

Post by pohl » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:35 PM UTC

jonknee wrote: post #72

nicksergeant wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Cheating" is not "making a mistake".

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…

Right know there are actual students at EPFL who are taking the Functional Programming Principles in Scala course, using the same web site that random joes like me are using at the same time. So for me it's not an actual college, but it is for those students at EPFL. They have no choice but to enforce academic honestly rules, given that real students at a real institution are involved.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#113

Post by mindstab » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:36 PM UTC

kd5bjo wrote: post #100

Permit wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>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 n…

Only require ID for the recognition. If you detect cheating, don't do anything about it until they confirm their ID to get their certification.

require ID for free online classes? Facebook, email, everything else doesn't require this. Good luck!

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#114

Post by turtlepower » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:37 PM UTC

kd5bjo wrote: post #100

Permit wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>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 n…

Only require ID for the recognition. If you detect cheating, don't do anything about it until they confirm their ID to get their certification.

You also need to manage false positives almost perfectly, as you're going to try to ruin someone's professional credibility.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#115

Post by PeterisP » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:38 PM UTC

michael_miller wrote: post #66

nicksergeant wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Cheating" is not "making a mistake".

I disagree with your assertion. Cheating is not necessarily an act of malice. As an example, a friend of mine (who is from India) helped another student (also Indian) with a programming project in an intro to CS class at my alma mater. My friend was trying to help a friend out, not intentionally trying to break the rules. This took place during the first few weeks of school, mind you, and neither student had any sign…

I am taking this course - it's impossible to not notice these rules, there are annoying confirmations at every single submission or multiple choice test that you are submitting your own individual work only. I.e., submitting a program copied off web is 100% intentional fraud.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#116

Post by dschiptsov » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:40 PM UTC

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…

Indeed, the possibility to learn quickly, without wasting time on filtering and validating publicly available information (mostly long, self-praising blog posts by narcissists) is such a rare opportunity.

Certification is second after ability, as it is in most arts and activities, except scams, such as SAP, Oracle, Cisco or other pay-walled artificial hierarchies.

To put it differently - certification is for those, who are unable to prove/show his abilities second time.)

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#117

Post by blaines » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:41 PM UTC

ramblerman wrote: post #99

blaines wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People shouldn't let cheating degrade the quality of education. You either possess the skills or you don't, and if you don't you shouldn't act like you do. It'll probably be obvious. Here's the scenario in my mind... A: "Oh hey I know how to program Scala" B: "Ok program Scala..." A: "Well I only got the cert, I don't actually know." B: "Sorry I guess you're not qualified then. Why don't you learn?"

"Ok program scala" Yeah that sounds like a great interview. How long do you let them go, half an hour, a day? Do you think you can adequately judge someones abilities like this?

Who said interview? You did.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#118

Post by im3w1l » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:42 PM UTC

mindstab wrote: post #113

kd5bjo wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only require ID for the recognition. If you detect cheating, don't do anything about it until they confirm their ID to get their certification.

require ID for free online classes? Facebook, email, everything else doesn't require this. Good luck!

You could make it required for a certificate but not for taking the classed.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#119

Post by hoytie » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:42 PM UTC

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…

For many of us, the value is in the learning opportunity. Some people, I imagine, are out of work and need a way to pick up skills and job credentials cheaply. For them I think huge value could be found in a certification. Having a certificate on your resume can start an interesting conversation in an interview, show personal initiative, and so forth.

Re: Coursera's Functional Programming - Cheating Discovered

#120

Post by blaines » Tue, Oct 09, 2012, 4:43 PM UTC

rkda wrote: post #109

Bootvis wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have the sign the honor code again when you submit the homework. At least for the course I'm taking.

I second this. Should make most people uncomfortable with cheating. Those who go through are ones who don't give a shit.

Now that I have some spare time I'll take another course and pay better attention :)