Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating • Hacker News Board

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#81

Post by bonoboTP » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:42 PM UTC

ares623 wrote: post #76

datahack wrote: post #56

This is how higher education was done for literal centuries before moving to the written word. So it’s not exactly innovative to return to oral arguments. But what it does threaten to do is effectively abandon all the efficiencies of the written word. When higher education evolved into a mass system in the 1800s and into the 1900s, pure oral examination was looked at as super inefficient. A written paper could be han…

But even with the written exam, wouldn't the bottleneck still be there where the professors still need to read through all the papers? I guess its definitely more efficient and asynchronous, but I can't imagine by much assuming the same and equal rigor is applied.

Grading written exams is delegated to teaching assistants / PhD students.

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#82

Post by bonoboTP » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:44 PM UTC

otterley wrote: post #64

bonoboTP wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None, but have interacted with American students at European universities and they were very lost without all the coddling and all kinds of support infrastructure and basically getting their life organized by administrators who personally attended to their matters and reminded them a million times about deadlines and so on. They were unprepared for actually having to manage their own studies, read up on rules, find o…

That happens when American students first join US universities too. It takes a few weeks for freshmen to get acquainted with the new reality of being completely responsible for handling their affairs and ensuring their success. It’s nothing to slam them about; that’s an artifact of coming from a system that provides more guide rails during primary education and childhood than European children might enjoy.

American colleges give way more support throughout the studies though. In Europe you're literally alone and nobody cares if you miss deadlines or you're failing out. No general consultations, no extra departments and admin bloat. You have to have your shit together.

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#83

Post by catlikesshrimp » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:45 PM UTC

obscurette wrote: post #79

azalemeth wrote: post #3

This is already the case for Master's degrees and above in Denmark. I've been the opponent examining students. We ask Master's students to give US instruction on a topic (drawn randomly on a card in front of them, from a list they know a few days in advance). They do a chalk and talk on a topic for about fifteen minutes with three to five professors being "dumb students". It works fantastically and at the end it's ve…

64 year old nerd with social phobias here. When I was in school, I had to practice oral knowledge tests since grade one. I had my first oral exam in grade six (math) and 2-3 oral exams every year since then. If I hadn't had that experience, I would never have gotten into university. I still don't like verbal communications with people (especially in a tense situations like exam), I'm slow etc, but it's manageable bec…

Would it help to be interviewed in a room where there is no other person, and you can be seen through a camera and communicate through magnetic speakers?

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#84

Post by moffkalast » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:45 PM UTC

datahack wrote: post #56

This is how higher education was done for literal centuries before moving to the written word. So it’s not exactly innovative to return to oral arguments. But what it does threaten to do is effectively abandon all the efficiencies of the written word. When higher education evolved into a mass system in the 1800s and into the 1900s, pure oral examination was looked at as super inefficient. A written paper could be han…

> Students with speech differences, anxiety disorders, hearing impairments, or simply less fluency in the language of instruction face an extra barrier that a written submission does not impose. The written form, for all its flaws, leveled some of that ground. Shall we abandon the differently abled because machines disrupt the academic system and essentially make cheating effective?

Universities are entirely elective, why would they need to cater specifically to disabilities? Driving schools don't make exceptions for the blind. There are skills that people expect you to have with a certain kind of diploma, and it reflects poorly on the school if they don't have a standard to hold people to. Not being able to present your work in a basic way is one of those mandatory skills that imo makes you unqualified to graduate if you don't grasp it.

I'm not saying you can't make an exception for a person or two who is clearly as good or better than the rest otherwise, but people will always try to misuse as many exceptions as they can, en masse, as an excuse to just avoid doing required work.

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#85

Post by subhobroto » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:46 PM UTC

simonklitj wrote: post #63

subhobroto wrote: post #58

The more I read about articles like these, I grow even more convinced that the education industry as a whole, regardless of the country or stature, has kind of lost their plot. Sometimes I even wonder if this is the outcome of sheer laziness, fear or both. When I speak to professors, teachers and students - It's also surprising that "top tier" institutions are fighting AI harder (outside extremely specific courses li…

Depends on what skills you want the students to have. In e.g., philosophy, allowing students to write their assessments with the help of LLMs changes the students’ depth of understanding, as well as their ability to synthesize, formalize, and drum up their own arguments and objections. These are all useful skills, even in a post-LLM world.

> allowing students to write their assessments with the help of LLMs changes the students’ depth of understanding, as well as their ability to synthesize, formalize, and drum up their own arguments and objections

indeed but LLMs improve these capabilities. Let me explain:

Most educators behave as if using an LLM robs the student of their ability to think. That has not and never been my experience.

You can just tell an LLM to debate, find out inconsistencies and issues in your writing, and challenge you, and it will very well do that!

LLMs for me, cheaply replace teachers who can barely be accessed during office hours because they are so busy doing research or overwhelmed with grading coursework.

In a typical educational setup, I might have half an hour at best with a teacher who looks kindly upon me, and at worst, five minutes with a teacher who doesn't like being around me. An LLM has no emotion, but it has knowledge, it has inference rules, and it has the ability to push back, debate, and find out inconsistencies, bugs and gaps in my thinking.

Behavior that is exactly what I need consistently, in a good teacher.

A frontier LLM is a good teacher who doesn't play games, has no emotion, infinite patience and always available for $20/mo.

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#86

Post by thomasahle » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:51 PM UTC

bunderbunder wrote: post #69

azalemeth wrote: post #3

This is already the case for Master's degrees and above in Denmark. I've been the opponent examining students. We ask Master's students to give US instruction on a topic (drawn randomly on a card in front of them, from a list they know a few days in advance). They do a chalk and talk on a topic for about fifteen minutes with three to five professors being "dumb students". It works fantastically and at the end it's ve…

I expect a lot of the social anxiety can be mitigated by arranging things so that students get a chance to know the examiners and build a rapport with them ahead of time. (E.g., if they’re an instructor then make sure they have office hours and encourage students to go.) I’ve got my mental health challenges but that’s how things worked in my grad school and I got by just fine.

> I expect a lot of the social anxiety can be mitigated by arranging things so that students get a chance to know the examiners and build a rapport with them ahead of time.

That's not my experience. Standing in front of somebody who's been your teacher and you might look up to is way scarier than some rando.

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#87

Post by jimbokun » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:51 PM UTC

datahack wrote: post #56

This is how higher education was done for literal centuries before moving to the written word. So it’s not exactly innovative to return to oral arguments. But what it does threaten to do is effectively abandon all the efficiencies of the written word. When higher education evolved into a mass system in the 1800s and into the 1900s, pure oral examination was looked at as super inefficient. A written paper could be han…

Complete bullshit.

Universities in the US charge fortunes and pay instructors a pittance while plowing ever more money into “administrators”. Fire half the administrators and hire more instructors to both proctor exams and give more personalized instruction.

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#88

Post by pinkmuffinere » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:52 PM UTC

azalemeth wrote: post #3

This is already the case for Master's degrees and above in Denmark. I've been the opponent examining students. We ask Master's students to give US instruction on a topic (drawn randomly on a card in front of them, from a list they know a few days in advance). They do a chalk and talk on a topic for about fifteen minutes with three to five professors being "dumb students". It works fantastically and at the end it's ve…

> We ask Master's students to give US instruction on a topic (drawn randomly on a card in front of them, from a list they know a few days in advance)

This is also an absolutely great way to ensure the participants really understand what they’re saying, even aside from ai-related concerns. You could always pull definitions straight from textbooks, and write something which mostly makes sense but that you don’t really understand. But you really can’t teach something unless you do understand it, imo. The best command I ever got on a topic was due to TA’ing

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#89

Post by jimbokun » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:54 PM UTC

ares623 wrote: post #76

datahack wrote: post #56

This is how higher education was done for literal centuries before moving to the written word. So it’s not exactly innovative to return to oral arguments. But what it does threaten to do is effectively abandon all the efficiencies of the written word. When higher education evolved into a mass system in the 1800s and into the 1900s, pure oral examination was looked at as super inefficient. A written paper could be han…

But even with the written exam, wouldn't the bottleneck still be there where the professors still need to read through all the papers? I guess its definitely more efficient and asynchronous, but I can't imagine by much assuming the same and equal rigor is applied.

You can be certain many instructors are having AI do a lot of their grading.

Re: Denmark Requires Oral Defenses for Students' Written Work to Counter AI Cheating

#90

Post by fierycatnet » Sat, Aug 08, 2026, 7:54 PM UTC

azalemeth wrote: post #3

This is already the case for Master's degrees and above in Denmark. I've been the opponent examining students. We ask Master's students to give US instruction on a topic (drawn randomly on a card in front of them, from a list they know a few days in advance). They do a chalk and talk on a topic for about fifteen minutes with three to five professors being "dumb students". It works fantastically and at the end it's ve…

That's how my school did it even for high school courses. End of the year exams were infront of the committee. Same thing, you pull a ticket and have few minutes to prepare the answer. I aced physics course, that was a proud moment but credits didnt transfer when we moved overseas...