Earlier quoted context omitted.
You forget things can be signed, with the key owned by the school. It can be done.
Does signing really make this easily auditable from the professor’s perspective?
Extremely non-tech savvy, hates computers, and is gonna grumble "What the hell is a PGP? Better not be another one of those phone code things." as you try to pitch this highly-technological solution to a largely niche problem domain.