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College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

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Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#131

Post by II2II »

bee_rider wrote: post #15
zamadatix wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always preferred the "you get some grades along the way to gauge your progress but the lion's share of the weight went to the proctored exams" method unless the lion's share of the normal work was also proctored anyways (at which point it doesn't really matter how it's done). The reason was less for myself and more because anything group related suddenly shot up in quality when the other individual work classmates…

The things I don’t like about putting too much weight in the exams are: * It’s sort of unnecessarily high stakes for the students; a couple hours to determine your grade for many hours of studying. * It’s pretty artificial in general; in “real life” you have the ability to go around online and look for sources. This puts a pretty low ceiling on the level of complexity you can actually throw at them.

> It’s pretty artificial in general; in “real life” you have the ability to go around online and look for sources.

Sort of. In real life, you are expected to have immediate knowledge of your field and (in some environments) be able to perform under pressure. I'm not going to pretend the curriculum is a perfect match for what people should know, but it does provide a common baseline to be able to have a common point of reference when communicating with colleagues. I would suggest the most artificial thing about exams is the format.

> It’s sort of unnecessarily high stakes for the students; a couple hours to determine your grade for many hours of studying.

I don't like dismissing the ordeal of people who face test anxiety, but tests are not really high stakes. There is a potential that a person will have to repeat a course if it is a requirement for their degree. At least at the institutions I attended, the grade distribution across exams and assignments, combined with a late drop date, meant that failing a course was only an option if you choose it to be. A student may be forced to face some realities about their dedication/priorities, work habits, time management, interests, abilities, etc.. It may force a student to make some hard decisions about where they want their life to lead, but it does not bar them from success in life. And those are the worse case scenarios. A more typical scenario is that you end up with a lower GPA.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#132

Post by Moonye666 »

terrabitz wrote: post #129
ninjahawk1 wrote: post #122

In one of my classes the approach was the opposite, I’m expected to do Ph.D level work as an undergrad and am expected to use AI. In a different one she just said so long as you say AI was used you’re fine to use it. In the rest of them AI is considered cheating. To say we have discrepancies in the rules in an understatement. No one seems to have the exact answer on how to do it. I personally feel like expecting Ph.D…

It's not inherently contradictory, just like using a calculator could be considered cheating depending on the context. If you're just learning basic arithmetic, a calculator is cheating since it shortcuts the path to learning. OTOH in calculus, a calculator is necessary. You still have to have a deep understanding of the concepts and functions to succeed. It's still a new tech so I'm not surprised a lot of teachers h…

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Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#133

Post by Moonye666 »

vunderba wrote: post #58
djmips wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow it feels like the Loebner prize went away right at the dawn of the LLM. Is it correlated?

Yeah I definitely think LLMs contributed to its demise. To be honest, nobody in academic AI circles took it very seriously, because it kind of devolved into a contest over who could create the most convincing illusion of intelligence . Participants spent more time polishing up the natural language parsing aspects in conjunction with pre‑programming elaborate backstories for their chatbot's bios among other psychologi…

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Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#135

Post by Moonye666 »

Levitz wrote: post #121
maplethorpe wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't the selling point of AI that it does it for you? What's to learn?

"It does X for you" is the point of many technologies. You still require knowledge to work around it. Context helps immensely, for example. Think of what you can do that someone outside tech can't.

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Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#136

Post by ryukoposting »

RhysabOweyn wrote: post #40

Why are people promoting the idea that exams are not written or given in person anymore? I graduated relatively recently and maybe had 1 take home exam during my entire education. Every other exam was proctored in person and written. The professor who made the take home exam also made it much more difficult than a normal exam so I would not really say it was easier than a normal in person test.

Things have changed drastically since COVID-19, at least in the US. Tons of schools and universities shifted to online systems, and never abandoned the systems they built up when it was time to go back to school.

I graduated in 2020, so I've only gotten to see the changes secondhand through friends and family who are teachers, and through my sibling who graduated a few years after me. But the difference is staggering.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#137

Post by antonymoose »

jason_zig wrote: post #89
gpm wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also way more susceptible to cheating in traditional non-AI ways. And your mark ends up depending a lot on how much time you have to invest independent of how good you are at the course material. Assignments and projects are great for learning, but suck for evaluation.

is evaluation that important? ultimately if you can't do the work you're only cheating yourself in the long run...

You say that but I was a Class of 2013, aka during the massive hiring boom of the teens. I tutored a friend of mine with a Ds get Degrees mentality who eventually graduated and now works an ass-in-seat job for Booz Allen or one of those types. I used to joke about it with another friend, that his diploma ought to include an asterisk and a half dozen other names for how much we ultimately did on his grades take homes. I’m pretty sure he makes about the same as me by now purely on tenure.

Personally, I dropped out despite a full ride+ becuase why would I put in work for a no name state school when I already has an FTE job as a developer out of high school anyway.

Turns out fraudulent action can still get the bag.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#138

Post by erelong »

Things like this are well-intentioned but idk why there aren't more teachers creating optional "side quests" like these for students that want them instead of forcing them to do things like these

optional "side quests" would allow teachers to create some standard accepted "main quest" curriculum and then just create a bunch of (even possibly "fun") "side quests" students can work on in their spare time for extra skill development

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#139

Post by stingraycharles »

throwatdem12311 wrote: post #30

When I did my Computer Science degree the vast majority of courses were 50% final, 30% midterm - even programming exams were hand written, proctored by TAs in class or in the gymnasium - assignments/labs/projects were a small part of your grade but if you didn’t do them the likelihood you’d pass the term exams was pretty darn low. We already had AI proof education.

Yeah exactly, I remember having to write Java and C++ by hand in college in the early 2000s. It was also a good test how well you knew the syntax.

Re: College instructor turns to typewriters to curb AI-written work

#140

Post by ryukoposting »

Swizec wrote: post #62
mjlee wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds extremely susceptible to unconscious bias, or even just straightforward discrimination.

It does! That’s why you can ask to be evaluated by a commission of professors. If you don’t pass after 3 tries, commission is mandatory. You also have a paper trail of written exams and midterms to back you up. If you keep getting good grades and failing the oral, people will find that obviously suspicious. Honestly the only times I had any trouble in the orals were the exams where I baaaaarely passed the written. Us…

> That’s why you can ask to be evaluated by a commission of professors.

Ah yes, the classic "if you think the system is abusing you, you shall out yourself to the system that's abusing you if you want any chance of recourse." Because a tribunal run by the people you're lodging a complaint against can't possibly be biased.

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